


Whispered Word

by Seraphim0



Series: Wings as Black as Night [2]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Nightwing (Comics), Young Justice (Cartoon), Young Justice - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Barbara Gordon is Batgirl, Batfamily (DCU) Feels, Batfamily Dynamics (DCU), Between Seasons/Series, Bruce Wayne is Batman, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Canon-Typical Violence, Court of Owls, Courtesy of Jason, Deception, Dick Grayson is Nightwing, Dick Grayson is a Talon in the epilogue, Explicit Language, Family, Family Secrets, Horror, Jason Todd is Robin, Mystery, Paranoia, Prequel, Set Between Young Justice Season 1 and Season 2, Suspicions, of course, post-Season 1, pre-season 2, unbetad
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:55:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 42,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26095225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Seraphim0/pseuds/Seraphim0
Summary: (Prequel to Broken Wings)"He must be new to Gotham."That was the easy explanation. It was tempting to believe. Gotham was Batman's city after all. He knew every alleyway and every criminal within its' borders. Nothing in this city escaped his sight.But as Bruce looked down at the golden owl crest so delicately pressed into the knife that had nearly killed him, something stirred within his core. An unease that crept throughout his chest.An assassin with skills that rivaled his own, and whose reflexes were identical to those of Nightwing.A contract put out on Bruce Wayne, not Batman.The Court of Owls...It was tempting to believe that this was something new, because that meant Gotham was still his city, and this was just another criminal. But something within Bruce's soul told him that this wasn't something new. It was something ancient.Something dark.
Relationships: Alfred Pennyworth & Bruce Wayne, Barbara Gordon & Dick Grayson, Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Jason Todd
Series: Wings as Black as Night [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1749139
Comments: 26
Kudos: 78





	1. Darkness Falls

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Prequel to Broken Wings, meant to take place during the time that Bruce and the Batfamily first encountered the Court of Owls. Here are some ground rules:
> 
> (1) Much like in the original comics, Bruce doesn't want to believe the Court of Owls exists because that would mean something else ruled Gotham before he did.
> 
> (2) Because this is their first encounter, no one knows about Nightwing's connection to the Court, but they will all be shocked when they find out.
> 
> (3) At this point, Jason Todd is Robin. While he and Dick do get along rather well, and Dick even passed on the Robin mantle and costume to Jason, there is some tension after Bruce adopts Jason.
> 
> (4) Bruce and Dick haven't spoken since Bruce adopted Jason. Neither of them knows how to approach the subject, and Dick was very hurt because it felt like Bruce was intentionally rejecting him.
> 
> That's pretty much it. Enjoy!

It all began in the dead of night.

This night was a rarity, in that Batman had not gone out on patrol. While Batman almost always spent his nights in the skies of Gotham, Bruce Wayne occasionally had to forgo that in order to keep up his billionaire playboy facade.

It had been a simple gala meant to commemorate the new children's hospital that he and a few others had helped raise the funding for. The gala itself had taken place at the aforementioned hospital. He had sipped white wine and traded small talk with some socialites while others whispered to each other about 'Bruce's street rat charity case'. Alfred had come as well, if for no other reason than to make sure that Jason wouldn't give such people black eyes for their troubles.

A few people had asked about Dick. When they did, Bruce was tempted to tell them in his trademark Batman tone that it was none of their business. Instead, he had waved them off and said that Dick couldn't make it.

Bruce and Dick...that was a can of worms that no one was ready to approach. They hadn't spoken a word to each other since Bruce finalized Jason's adoption over a month ago. The last time he had seen his eldest, he was leaving the manor while doing his best to hide his tears.

As far as small blessings went, it hadn't at all put a damper on Dick and Jason's relationship. While Jason was still rather brash and vulgar with Dick, it was no more so than with anyone else. Dick continued to be impossibly patient with his younger brother, smile through the crude insults, and gather Jason up in his arms to plant a noogie on him.

According to what he had heard from Barbara though, Dick was still very upset with him. Whenever the topic of either Batman or Bruce Wayne came up in conversation, Dick's attitude seemed to depress and he would immediately change the topic. It was a sad state of affairs for the original Dynamic Duo, but Bruce had continued to convince himself that it would be in poor taste and disrespectful to the Flying Graysons to submit the adoption papers he had kept in his desk for so many years. Moreover, what did Bruce know about being a parent. Hell, he had still been a young man when Dick entered his life, and his career as Batman had only just begone. A formal adoption would have been too overwhelming for both parties.

And Dick was sixteen now. He would be turning seventeen in a few months. It seemed a little late to file the adoption papers he always kept in his desk at the manor. And quite frankly, Bruce was somewhat upset with Dick as well.

The young acrobat had already graduated from high school, a protege in all things, only to drop out of college after one semester. That had annoyed Bruce to a lesser degree. He understood that Dick had just started as Nightwing and now had his own city to look after, but it still left the question of what he would do for a living. The board would never let him take over Bruce's role at Wayne Enterprises if he had completed so much as a single college course.

When Dick applied to the Police Academy, that had been the final straw. Bruce was reasonably sure that Dick was only doing it to antagonize him for his hatred of guns. Between that and Jason's adoption, neither were on speaking terms with the other.

The Wayne family left the gala that night with Bruce's heart sunken. Since adopting Dick was out of the question, he had no idea how to repair his relationship with his eldest. Whenever Batman had a problem, Nightwing was still at the ready and more than happy to help. But if he took it even the smallest step further and did something as innocent as address the acrobat by his first name, Dick would immediately shut down and tell Bruce that he had no interest in discussing their personal problems while there was a case to work on.

Bruce was finally allowed to escape his thoughts when they arrived home. Jason ran out of the car with haste, eager to get to his room and play video games. Alfred chased after him while calling to his young master that there was no running in the manor.

Bruce allowed himself to smile slightly at the antics as he stepped out of the car as well. He slowly made it p the driveway and climbed the stone staircase that lead to the front door. But Bruce turned back one last time at the sound of screeching.

It was a bat.

It was flying rather close to the ground, beating it's wings sharply whenever it began to drift too low. It wasn't very far from him either. Maybe twenty feet away, gliding over the fountain in front of the manor. Bruce hadn't seen a bat on the grounds of the manor in some time. Not since his encounter with them as a child, which simultaneously terrified and inspired him. It was rare to see one drift outside the cave like this.

Before he could ponder the thought any further, something descended on the bat in an instant. Brightness overcame the darkness of the night as a cluster of snow white feathers suddenly overtook the form of the bat. Bruce heard a sharp cry come from the small mammal which was quickly silenced by the creature that had landed on it. Even from that distance, Bruce could see the blood that trickled into the fountain as the creature landed on the edge.

It had it's back to Bruce and had it's head bobbed down to further consume its' kill. It seemed to make quick work of the bat, as it's back soon straightened. While it's body remained still, the neck and head rotated independently to the point that any other bird's neck would have broken.

The owl was starring directly at Bruce with impossibly yellow eyes, blood dripping from its' beak.

Bruce never allowed himself to show weakness, even when he was alone. But in that moment, a chill passed through him as the owl rotated its' head back into place and spread its' glorious white wing, taking off into the night to search for its' next victim.

Bruce had never been one to believe in omens before then. But in the weeks to follow, he would find out that owl was a sign of things to come.

* * *

It was only three nights later when it came for him.

A still, quiet, peaceful night. Something that rarely occurred in Gotham. A calm before the storm.

Bruce and Jason had come home from patrol early that night. For once, there hadn't been any criminal activity in the city. At least, not on the surface. He had put Jason to bed despite the younger's protests, and ultimately had to resort to bribing the boy with the promise of a new video game console in exchange for his cooperation. Jason begrudgingly agreed and was asleep within the hour. ~~Bruce could tell by his snoring~~

As for Bruce, he had been awake for thirty-six hours at that point. That wasn't normally a cause for concern. The longest he had gone without sleep was five days. But Alfred insisted that he get sleep whenever the chance presented itself, and he was in no position to argue. No one argued with Alfred.

He had gotten himself into a rather peaceful position in his bed. He was just at the point of serenity, when he allowed his mind to blank and his body to ease. Bruce had been just shy of a moment away from drifting off when he heard those godforsaken words for the first time.

"Bruce Wayne, The Court of Owls has sentenced you to die."

His many years of training shook any exhaustion from his in a matter of seconds. His body reacted before his mind did. He quickly rolled over in his mattress, just as a knife plunged into the spot where he had just been laying. Bruce grabbed the lamp off the bedside counter and threw it at his would-be assailant.

It shattered against the dark figure's torso and caused them to stumble back, if only for a moment. But that was all the Dark Knight needed.

Bruce ran to him and delivered a powerful blow to his gut and then followed up with a punch of equal power to the face. The assassin was sent whirling into the bedroom door which shattered on impact.

The assassin snarled and made a movement to get up. In that split second, Bruce's mind went to work to catalog everything he could see.

The assassin was about his size in terms of height, but was nowhere near his build. His arms were by no means thin, but his limbs did not bear the labor induced bulk that Bruce possessed. It was clearly a male by the build and voice. It has hard to make out much more about the man behind the mask, as his uniform covered every square inch of skin. The material was entirely black, save for the silver knives that were strapped to his chest by a long brown leather band, and gauntlets awash with silver on each of his forearms. While his attention was drawn to his arms, Bruce also picked up on the golden claws that caged his fingers on each hand. As for the mask itself, it was black as well with the addition of gold ornaments. It appeared as a hood that covered his entire head, and it possessed a pair of orange goggles that appeared to glow in the darkness.

The assassin hissed as he composed himself. For an instant it appeared that he would lunge at Bruce, but the assassin surprised him by throwing one of the many knives on his person at Bruce with deadly accuracy.

Bruce ducked out of the way and the knife sailed through the air, hitting the wall behind him. The assassin used the distraction to speed down the halls of Wayne Manor, distancing himself from Bruce...

...and heading towards Jason's room.

Bruce chased after him. The assassin was incredibly fast. Faster than one would expect from a man his size. However, there were shards of wood jutting out of the assassin's back. No doubt from when Bruce threw him through the door. It was obviously causing him discomfort, which was causing him to move slower than he otherwise would have. He was fast.

But in that moment, Bruce was faster.

He grabbed the assassin by the back of his garb and yanked backwards. The assassin tumbled over before falling into Bruce's grasp, and was essentially dragged along as Bruce ran forward. When Bruce reached the end of the hall, to the balcony that overlooked the foyer, he promptly used his strength to propel the assassin forward.

His goal was partially accomplished when the mercenary was hurled through the polished ornate railing, shattering it into wooden splinters as he continued to fall. But then he did something that Bruce was not prepared for.

He twisted and turned his limbs in the air. It was not meant as mere reflexive movements or an attempt to brace himself for the fall, but rather he moved with an aura of grace. He grabbed at the bottom of the chandelier just as he was about to fall three stories, and used his momentum to flip himself upwards and land elegantly atop the arms of the fixture. While Bruce's mind reeled from the remarkable adjustments the assassin was able to make in mid air, his assailant took a flying leap towards him and free jumped the sizable gap between the chandelier and balcony.

Bruce's mind snapped back to attention the moment the man was within range.

They traded blows in the forms of punches, kicks, and quick jabs for what seemed like hours. Not long after they started, the two opponents seemed to fall into a type of rhythm. Bruce, blocking each attack and attempting to counter with a strike of his own. The assassin, attacking with martial art expertise and evading each counter with grace.

Once this happened, and his body was allowed to act on reflex and muscle memory, Bruce could allow his mind to wander to what the man had said during the initial encounter.

_"Bruce Wayne, The Court of Owls has sentenced you to die."_

The Court of Owls.

Only there was no Court of Owls. He had certainly looked into it enough times. There had even been a low point in his formative years where he suspected the mythical organization of being the perpetrators behind his parents' murder. But every lead came up dry. It always did. It always would. If the Court was so much as mentioned offhandedly over the course of a case, he would double check every possible avenue that might point to their existence, only to turn up nothing.

This was merely someone who wanted him to think the Court of Owls was real. But there was something else that weighed heavily on his mind. Someone was targeting him. Not Batman, but Bruce Wayne.

This was no shakedown for money, nor was it an attempted kidnapping. Bruce was all too familiar with those. This was the attempted murder of someone who, as far as the public was concerned, was a mere reclusive philanthropist who drank too much and took in troubled kids. Not exactly assassination worthy. There had to be a reason for it. And whatever it was, Bruce was sure he wouldn't like it.

As the fight continued, Bruce never once had to take his body off autopilot. It was an odd sensation. Bruce had the fighting styles of everyone he ever traded blows with committed to memory. That way, even if a villain were to attempt disguising themselves with a new name and mask, Bruce still knew full well who they were. So regardless of what face was hiding underneath that mask, Bruce could say with utter surety that he had never encountered this man in his life. And yet...

It still somehow felt familiar. It was as though he had this fight before with a different adversary. It wasn't until later in the fight that Bruce finally realized what the origin of that familiarity was.

He attempted to deliver a powerful strike to the assassin's knee in an effort to cripple him. The assassin clearly relied on his agility and ability to evade blows in order to do battle. Once he was no longer able to move about with such ease and Bruce was able to keep him within range, the assassin wouldn't stand a chance.

But when Bruce attempted to deliver the sweeping kick to the man's leg, he slipped away again. It was not so much the fact that he dodged as the way that he dodged that caused Bruce to stop in his tracks.

He flipped backwards, entering a somersault as he flipped up in the air. It was a simple enough act at first, and did not have to go any further in order to achieve the goal of dodging the attack. He had already done so. But it was as though the assassin's body was also acting on it's own, and muscle memory had taken over.

That single turn in the air had turned into two.

Then three.

And after his forth, the assassin landed on the floor in a crouching position, watching as Bruce stared at him in awe.

Realization came crashing down on Bruce like he had just been thrown through a pane of glass.

A quadruple somersault.

The Flying Grayson's signature move, which earned them the title of the World's Greatest Acrobats.

Suddenly, when he thought back on the blows he had traded with the assailant, he no longer saw himself in mortal combat with a highly trained killer. Instead, his mind drew back even further, to a time when he was training a young child who seemed to parry and dodge his ever attack with natural born talent.

His reflexes and agility.

The deceivingly lithe body which was perfect for tight turns and flexibility.

The way he was able to twist in the air perfectly, grabbing onto the chandelier as though it were a trapeze bar.

This assassin...

He was moving like Nightwing.

He was moving _exactly_ like Nightwing.

The assassin was quick to act while Bruce processed what he had just seen. He lunged at Bruce with all his speed, causing the billionaire to back up on impulse. Bruce ducked as the assassin swiped his claws towards him, and left him to continue flying past the railing as the momentum of his lunge carried him off. But again, talent that was far too much like his protege's kicked in, as the assassin grabbed a hold of the chandelier's chain which anchored it to the ceiling and did a complete three hundred and sixty degree spin on it to send himself propelling back towards Bruce.

He landed a solid kick on Bruce's jaw as he flew back, knocking the Dark Knight off his balance. Before he could recuperate, a leg swept underneath his own, and he was on the ground. Just as he was about to get up, cold metal was pressed against his throat, constricting his breathing and knocking the back of his head against the ground.

Bruce looked up to find the assassin crouching over him, his expression unreadable behind his black hood. While he continued to restrain Bruce with one clawed hand, he sharply flexed the fingers on the other, causing the claws to further extend with a shrill sound of scrapping of metal.

Bruce glared at the assailant, knowing full well that there was only so much skill he could put into his fighting while unmasked. Even if it put his life in danger, he couldn't take the risk this creature seeing Bruce Wayne fighting exactly like Batman.

"Who are you?" Bruce said, scowling into a watered down version of his batglare. "What do you want?"

The assassin's form shook as he let out a deep and throaty chuckle. "Must I repeat myself?" There was something off in his voice. Something inhuman. It was not so distorted that Bruce couldn't understand him, but there was something in the sound of his speech that he had never heard from any man or animal. It sounded like some awful combination of nails on a chalkboard and the beating of a war drum all at once. "Very well. Bruce Wayne, The Court of Owls has sentenced you to die."

The assassin then lifted Bruce's head slightly off the ground with his strong grip and lowered his own to the point that their noses were practically touching. It took an effort on Bruce's part not to gag. The stench of death rolled of this man in waves.

His next words felt like an arrow being shot through his very soul.

"Oh, how I love killing Waynes." The assassin said as he playfully swept a cold claw against the bare flesh of Bruce's cheek.

Those words shook Bruce to his core as the assassin slammed his head back down to the wooden floor and raised a clawed hand above him. In any other situation Bruce already would have broken free of the assassin's grip and begun to deliver a series of crippling strikes to the critical areas of his body to immobilize him. But the combination of those words and this assailants' similarities to Dick shamefully caused his natural reflexes to come to a grinding halt.

But before the assassin could bring his bladed fingers down on Bruce's jugular, a sharp crash echoed through halls, and shards of white porcelain pouring over the assassin's shoulders. He let out a sharp cry and lowered his head as he brought up his claws to hold the wound to the back of his head. Once he bowed, Bruce could look over his head and see who he had to thank for saving his life.

Jason.

More than anything the boy looked shocked that someone was in the manor, never mind the fact that said intruder was also trying to kill Bruce. In any case, it was exactly the opening Bruce needed. When the assassin craned his neck to look at who had just smashed the vase against his head, Bruce clenched his fist and smashed it against the side of the assassin's hood, breaking one of the orange lenses of his goggles.

It caused the assassin to shift enough that Bruce was able to get his legs out from under the assassin's crouched position atop him, spinning around to land a kick to the same area as he did so.

But again, the assassin retreated from his attack with dramatic flourish. He began by slamming an open hand against the ground and lifting himself into the air, pressing his feet flat against the wall as he did so. This repositioned his head just enough so that Bruce's attempted kick to the temple sailed through the air without prejudice. Once the attack had passed, the assailant proceeded to kick against the wall and force himself further down the hallway, away from Jason and Bruce.

He landed again on his hands, only to flip himself onto his feet. As Bruce got up into a fighting stance beside his adoptive son, he could see Jason's expression morph into one of bewilderment at the strange movement. Clearly, his protege recognized Dick's signature fighting in this warrior as well.

The assassin chuckled under his breath as he looked at the two unmasked heroes who stood before him. When he looked up, Bruce could see his left eye past the shattered fragments of orange tinted glass from what remained of his goggle's left lens. A small trickle of blood was dripping out from the goggle and splattering on the floor. A shard of glass must have cut the skin around his eyes. Ordinarily, Bruce wouldn't have been able to make out the color of the iris from such a distance. But in the shadow that the remainder of the lens cast, he could just make out a yellow iris through the darkness.

"How perfectly proper." The assassin remarked as he outstretched his hands, as if to bask in what he was witnessing. His eyes seemed to narrow in on Bruce. For the briefest of moments, Bruce's mind flashed back to the owl that had stared at him three nights prior. "This isn't over Wayne."

The assailant seemed to allow gravity to overtake him, and allowed his upper body to fall forward only for him to turn on his heel and dart away from the Dynamic Duo.

Both raven haired males chased after him as the assassin raced down the halls with swiftness just shy of Kid Flash's. He ducked into one of the vacant guest bedrooms, but that didn't cause the heroes on his tail to stop. What did was the sound of glass shattering which occurred not a moment later. Though both were taken aback, neither one gave an inch in their pursuit.

Bruce got to the room first, making a sharp turn inwards. His suspicions were confirmed when he saw the large window on the wall opposite to the door smashed outward. He ran to it and surveyed the pavement below, as well as the surrounding grounds. The assassin was nowhere to be found.

Bruce heard Jason run in after him as he did a quick survey of the room to ensure it wasn't some manner of trick. As his guest bedrooms went, this was was significantly more modest. There was no closet nor adjoining bathroom, and the bed was too low to the ground for a man of his size to be hiding underneath it. If he wasn't in Bruce's immediate field of vision, there was nowhere he could have been hiding within the room.

"There's no fucking way." Jason said as he looked down at the spot the assassin would have landed. Sure enough, there was flattened grass, as though a large sum of weight had just been pressed against it. "That's a three story drop. Anyone would have broken their neck making that jump. What the fuck? Did he _fly_ away?"

Honestly, an assassin with wings wouldn't have surprised Bruce at that point.

* * *

"How many times are you going to watch the same fucking video?"

"Until I find what I'm looking for."

In hindsight, Bruce certainly should have taken at least fifteen minutes out of training each day to work on Jason's language. Growing up on the streets gave him a rather broad vocabulary for foul words at the ripe age of twelve. Even Alfred was unsuccessful in his attempts to censure some of Jason's most outrageous swears. Most times, Bruce would have at least made a vain effort to reprimand the boy. But that night was different.

After the assassin fled, he did a complete perimeter sweep of the grounds with Jason, but found nothing. After their search proved to be unfruitful, he had dawned the cowl for no other reason than habit as he entered the cave. Bruce immediately scoured all the security systems installed throughout the perimeter.

He didn't understand how it was possible. Not a single alarm had been tripped. The security feed which covered nearly ever square inch of the property hadn't caught a glimpse of the assailant coming or going. It was as though he materialized into the manor, then dissolved when he left.

"Who was that guy anyway?" Jason asked as he leaned over the edge of the computer desk with his elbows, holding up his head with a fist.

"I don't know." Bruce responded. He had already run the M.O. through vicap and his personal data bank. While Bruce wasn't able to catch the assassin on screen entering the manor, he had caught him on various angles after their fight broke out. And with those recordings came audio samples of his voice as well. Lastly, he had taken the small drop of blood that the man left behind and ran it against ever database there was.

But everything came back negative. No voice IDs, no match on his M.O., no hits on his DNA, and no warrants out on his mask in any criminal database. Whoever he was, no state, federal, or international agency knew anything about him.

"You didn't recognize him?" Jason asked. "He must be new to Gotham."

"Maybe." Bruce mumbled as he continued to survey the security tapes, only to come up with nothing.

"If _you_ didn't recognize him, then he's new." Jason said as he pushed against the edge of the computer to send his chair wheeling through the cave with carefree childishness.

"I'm trying to concentrate Jason." Bruce reprimanded lightly. Though internally, he knew nothing would come of it. He could stare at these screens till his eyes bled. It wouldn't change a thing. The assassin was nowhere to be found on the security feed. But it made no sense. Bruce had intentionally constructed the system of cameras in such a way that it was virtually impossible to escape one without being picked up on another.

He hadn't come in through the gate or any other direct means. That much was certain. But it still left Bruce at a lose for what method he _had_ used.

Jason had been pondering the idea for some time as well. He even had a theory of his own. And it was one that he knew Bruce wouldn't like.

"B, I know you don't want to hear this," Jason began hesitantly. "But there is one entrance unaccounted for. One without any surveillance footage."

Bruce turned in his seat once Jason was finished and narrowed his eyes on his protege, as though Jason had just made an accusation. "He did _not_ come in through the cave."

It was true that as paranoid as Bruce was with security, he wasn't willing to take the risk of putting any type of recording device in the cave for fear that it could end up in the wrong hands. Such a video would reveal his identity, among other things. So in fact, not having any cameras in the cave was an extension of his paranoia rather than a reduction of it.

But the cave was like Fort Knox. The security systems he had installed made maximum security prisons look like a joke. Attempting to break in would be like trying to climb Everest in shorts on an extremely cold day. No one entered the cave without Batman knowing and consenting to it. It simply couldn't happen.

Jason seemed downtrodden at Bruce dismissal of his idea, and timidly tried again. "Bruce-"

"He did NOT come in through the cave!" Bruce snapped in frustration. Though that frustration quickly gave way to regret when he saw Jason flinch slightly. Bruce's eyes widened. Shit shit shit. Jason was raised by an abusive criminal. In his experience, _every_ angry outburst lead to violence and a subsequent beating. Batman groaned as he raised up a gloved hand to pull back his cowl.

"I'm sorry Jason. I didn't mean to yell." Bruce apologized, keeping his eyes lowered. It wasn't enough that he had blatantly destroyed his relationship with one son. He had to go out of his way to sabotage his fragile connection to the other.

Jason nodded, which seemed to be the closest thing Bruce would get to an acceptance of the apology. However, his soft features were still knit into an aura of concern. "Bruce, what's going on? This isn't the first time someone's broken into the manor, and it's not the first time someone tried to kill you in your civilian identity. What happened?" The young boy asked. "Did that guy do or say something?"

There were times that Bruce regretted passing on his detective abilities to his proteges. The most prevalent of these instances were when they used facial recognition techniques that he taught them to tell how he was holding up.

Setting that aside for a moment, Bruce pondered the best way to go about responding. Among the things that the assassin had done, including the attempt to kill him, one thing in particular stuck out. His similarities to Dick.

All the ways they were alike; the build, techniques, and reflexes, were all things that had come to Dick naturally through his years as an acrobat. Bruce couldn't have taught them if he tried. Moreover, he had no idea how an assassin would come by that type of training or why. He wanted to say that it could just be a coincidence. That perhaps this assassin had simply been an acrobat in a previous life and keep it simple. But Batman didn't believe in coincidence.

But he knew better than to voice this to Jason. Despite how his relationship with Dick was in the gutter, his oldest and youngest had been getting along rather well. Even though Dick was clearly somewhat jealous of Jason over the adoption, he never let it show to his younger brother. That was the type of person Dick was. He just turned the other cheek and never took out his problems on other people. He didn't want to risk that bond between his sons by telling Jason something that might make him suspicious of Dick.

Then there was the Court of Owls. But that fable was not something he was in the mood to share with Jason either. Jason had lived in Gotham all his life, so he probably knew the rhyme anyway, and with it knew that it was nothing but a story invented to frighten children. And now, some assassin was trying to use it as a scare tactic against Bruce Wayne. There was no need to tell Jason about something that was most likely meant as nothing more than a heavily veiled threat.

With both those secrets being kept under lock and key, Bruce decided that he would level with Jason about at least one thing the assassin had said that had gotten through to him.

"He did." Bruce answered honestly. "He told me he was there to kill me. And when he had me pinned down, he said 'Oh, how I love killing Waynes'."

Jason tensed up and his greenish blue eyes widened in shock and fear. He knew better than most what the full gravity and implication of those words must have meant to Bruce. "B...are you saying that this guy...and your parents-"

"My parents were murdered by Joe Chill." Bruce interrupted. Even though he was still guilty over having snapped at Jason earlier, he could not bring himself to listen to the end of that question. "I know that case better than anyone and I know who the perpetrator was. He even confessed and gave details that only the killer would know. My parents were the only Waynes to die under suspicious circumstances in the last fifty years. I don't know who that man was Jason, but he never killed my parents or any other Wayne. It was just to get under my skin."

Jason seemed to relax a bit and his shoulders fell, though he was still looking at Bruce with distress. "If you believe that, then why does it bother you?"

"Because it worked." Bruce answered, turning away from Jason in his chair. "I've spent years building myself up for situations like this one. The taunts and lies. The enemy saying whatever they can in an effort to knock you off your game. It doesn't bother me that he brought my parents into it. It bothers me that it _worked_."

Jason's distress morphed into bewilderment. "What do you-"

"I froze Jay." Bruce said with his head bowed in shame. "He got through to me. All he had to do was say the name 'Wayne' and I was down in an instant. It's pathetic. Something that happened years ago that can still get through to me."

Jason finally seemed to calm down after hearing Bruce full explanation. At least, that was how it appeared on the outside. Internally he was pissed off. It was mostly his standard setting for life. But this time it was for a specific reason.

Bruce may have been their son, but he had no fucking right undermining his parents' murder. No right at all.

Because if he could make light of the event that turned him into Batman, what did that say about the murder of Dick's parents? What did that say about Jason's entire childhood?

These were the events that shaped them. Multiple events in Jason's case, but still. They each had their defining moment. And no one, not even the members of their fucked up little family themselves, had the right to belittle them.

Still, Jason had in mind just how much those words had affected Bruce. So instead of calling him out on his bullshit directly, he decided to approach it more calmly.

"Bruce...maybe I haven't been your Robin long enough to say this, but there's nothing wrong with letting yourself feel. Especially when someone brings your fucking _parents_ into it. I get it. They were your whole world. And what happened to them...it's what _made_ you. Made you everything you are. Plus, he was attacking Bruce Wayne, not Batman. He poked at that scab because that was something he knew about. Hell, it's something anyone not living under a rock knows about. That'll never happen with Batman. Secret ID and all. I'm just saying...you're allowed to be upset over it. And you're allowed to screw up just this once."

Bruce continued to look at the screen for Jason's entire speech. He made no comment during it, nor did he acknowledge it once he was done. Jason quirked a brow after an extended silence. "Uh...B?"

"Did you analyze that knife he left behind yet?" Bruce asked, spinning around in his chair.

Jason reeled from the drastic change in topic, and nearly stormed over to knock his mentor upside the head for ignoring him when he caught Bruce's expression. To the ordinary observer it was impassive. But to the protege he had painstakingly trained to read micro-expressions, it was a statement in and of itself.

_'Thank you Jay. I needed to hear that. You're a fine partner, and a wonderful son.'_

Or something like. Batman and Robin had always taken to reading each other as a form of shorthand rather than verbal contact. Bruce also used it for the things he was too emotionally constipated to say aloud.

Jason smirked slightly as he got up and went over to the mass spectrometer to retrieve the knife the assassin had thrown at Bruce, only for Jason to dig it out of the wall later. _"Only you Bruce."_ He thought to himself as he got the knife and printed sheet out from the machine.

He looked down to read it as he walked over to the Batcomputer. "Mostly steel. But part of it is twenty four carat gold. And there's some kind of...liquid resin on it. The mass-spec can't make heads or tails of it." He said as he handed Bruce the knife.

Bruce took the knife into his hands and looked over it. The knife was entirely metal. A small part of it where the ends squared off and the edges lost their sharpness acted as the hilt. Most of the blade was clear and reflective, save for a single golden circle pressed onto the hilt. There was a crest formed on that gold as well. One of an owl with its' wings outstretched. _"How thematic."_ Bruce thought cynically as he turned the knife over in his hand.

He took off one of his gloves and rolled the knife over in his bare hand. Jason had been correct. He could feel some type of residue on the knife rubbing off on his hands. It was like oil or grease. Something invisible. But the texture was too off to be either one of them.

"Thank you Jason." He said as he turned back to the computer, but kept his eyes on the knife. Specifically, on the owl insignia. "Head to bed now. You have school in the morning."

Bruce could see Jason's look of betrayal and indignation in his mind's eye as his son squawked out his reply. "Are you fucking with me?! Nearly being made a pincushion by some freaky looking guy in black isn't enough of a reason to ditch school?!"

"You're welcome to tell your teachers and principal about the freaky looking guy in black if you'd like and see if they believe you." Bruce said impassively.

Jason groaned, and Bruce just knew the boy was giving him the finger behind his back. "The longer I live here the more certain I am that _you're_ the most evil villain the world has ever seen. Joker and all them ain't got shit on you." The boy continued to cuss under his breath, even though he complied and went upstairs.

Bruce remained focused on the knife all throughout the tirade. He briefly thought back on Jason's words. Not the string of obscenities that the boy had unleashed on him a moment ago. Something he said much earlier about the assassin.

_"He must be new to Gotham."_

That was the easy explanation. It was tempting to believe. Gotham was Batman's city after all. He knew every alleyway and every criminal within its' borders. Nothing in this city escaped his sight.

But as Bruce looked down at the golden owl crest so delicately pressed into the knife that had nearly killed him, something stirred within his core. An unease that crept throughout his chest.

An assassin with skills that rivaled his own, and whose reflexes were identical to those of Nightwing.

A contract put out on Bruce Wayne, not Batman.

The Court of Owls...

It was tempting to believe that this was something new, because that meant Gotham was still his city, and this was just another criminal. But something within Bruce's soul told him that this wasn't something new. It was something ancient.

Something dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed the first chapter. Were you able to guess the identity of the Talon that attacked the manor?
> 
> By the way, you may recall that in my previous story I asked you for best wishes regarding a friend who was at serious risk of contracting the corona virus because of her health problems. She is doing much better now, and it really meant a lot to her when I showed her your comments. Now I have to ask that again.
> 
> My cousin isn't doing to well. Not the corona virus, but he is pretty ill. My aunt is beside herself over it. It would mean a lot to me if you could send up some prayers for him as well. Thank you~
> 
> Anyway, I plan to update soon. I hope you enjoyed the first chapter of my prequel. There's more to come! ;)


	2. The Talon's Face

_Two Weeks Later_

Lucius Fox cursed under his breath as he heard his office door open. He crept a little more under his desk, and gripped his Glock just a bit tighter.

Lucius was no fool. He knew full well of his employers' disapproval of firearms. But working under Batman, even in his civilian persona, was a risky trade. Since Lucius had children of his own to worry about, and he certainly didn't picture himself dawning a cape and mask, he simply decided that what Bruce didn't know wouldn't hurt him and kept a gun discreetly tucked in the drawer of his desk. But because he was meticulous in all aspects of his life, he still obtained all the necessary permits, so he suspected Bruce already knew about it. Still, the man never confronted him on it.

That was beside the point though. Because as intimidating as Bruce could be when he was angry, the creature currently in pursuit of Lucius was far more terrifying.

It all began in a simple conference room. He had just finished a presentation to the board of directors regarding a recent spike in their stock sales, and the money that came in with it along with how to properly spend it. Most of them were only pretending to listen.

The conference had long since ended and he had been gathering up his papers, more than ready to head home just in time to kiss his son and daughters goodnight when the conference door opened. He hadn't bothered to turn before telling his secretary, Sonia, that she could go home for the night. Terror gripped his chest like an predatory bird grappling at prey when a hand suddenly gripped his arm, nails tearing through the fine fabric of his suit.

He turned around and nearly screamed in horror. It was Sonia. She was starring at him with pleading eyes while her other hand gripped her neck, blood pouring from between her fingers in buckets. Someone had cut her throat.

She would have fallen to the ground if not for Lucius gripping her and gently laying her on her back, panic consuming him the entire time he did so. There was one word, Sonia's final word, that caused his heart to skip a beat.

_Run._

Lucius had turned back towards the door, ready to call out for someone to help, when he found the way to the door blocked by a figure in black. Looking up at him Lucius thought for a moment that it might be Batman.

He thought wrong.

This creature's entire face was covered by a hood with goggles, blood dripping from the claws woven into his gloves. In that state of terror, Lucius was reasonably sure all the man would have had to do was say 'boo' and Lucius would have died of a heart attack.

The next action was far more passive than that, but no less tragic. He felt the iron grip on his arm fade, and soon after disappear. He looked down at Sonia, her eyes already glazing over and looking away at nothing. He was so terrified that he didn't even have room to mourn.

Lucius' mind began to race with possibilities. He looked around for some way, any way, to get out before the same fate befell him as well. His eyes began to dart around the room, and landed on a fire extinguisher that was hung on the wall opposite to the assassin. Lucius ran to it as his only hope for escape and tore it from the wall, and fumbled with the lever and hose for a moment while the assassin advanced.

Lucius was sure he was going to die, and this would only delay it by a matter of moments, but he was desperate. He finally got the hose pointed at the assassin and pressed down on the lever, causing a rush of white mist to gust towards him.

The assassin leapt backwards, flipping through the air in a somersault as he did so. He landed on the conference table in a crouching position. He then made a guttural sound at Lucius that only a wild animal should have been capable of.

Lucius trembled but kept the extinguisher raised, ready to use it again when the assassin approached him next.

Only he never did.

The two seemed to engage in a staring contest, neither moving an inch nor taking their eyes of the other. At first Lucius could not grasp what was keeping the assassin in that position until something occurred to him. It wasn't a staring contest at all. The assassin's head was slightly bowed, as though he were looking at something positioned a tad lower than Lucius' head. Something in his hands.

The extinguisher.

Lucius never dared think himself a detective like his employer, but he could tell that was it. For some reason, the extinguisher was keeping the assassin from running to Lucius was claws outstretched.

Eager to test if his theory was true, Lucius nudged towards the assassin with the red tube. Once he did, the assassin seemed to flinch and raise a claw, not to attack, but to cover his head.

Lucius was right. Something about it was repelling the assassin.

With the extinguisher in hand, Lucius crept towards the door while keeping the hose firmly pointed at the figure in black. The assassin never moved except to turn and watch Lucius as he exited.

The moment he was out, Lucius ran like a madman to the elevator. He had to get out of here. He had to get security. He had to warn Bruce.

After what felt like an eternity of running down the hall, with the occasional turn of his head to make sure the assassin wasn't following him, Lucius rounded the corner that would take him to the elevator-

And stopped.

The assassin. He was _there_.

There...and standing less than a foot away from him.

The assassin quickly used one of his clawed gauntlets to knock the extinguisher from Lucius' hands, before using the other to grab Lucius by the throat. While Lucius grabbed the arm in an attempt to pry it away and kicked about wildly, the assassin raised him into the air.

His mind was a mess of jumbled thoughts as the pressure on his throat increased. This was not possible! He had turned back often enough that he would have seen the assassin exit the room. And even if he had, he would have had to round the hallway and get to the other side of the building in a matter of moments.

Lucius knew that humans like this existed. Bruce even worked with many of them. But he had no idea how to confront one himself.

Then, like manna from Heaven, a voice shouted, "Stop! Release Mister Fox and put your hands on your head! Do it now!"

Thank Heaven. Security. Bruce may not have enjoyed guns, but he took care to keep his employees well protected. These men were armed with guns while the assassin appeared to only have his claws. They would surely be able to bring him down when the need arose.

That was the night Lucius learned an important lesson. Never underestimate your foes.

The assassin dropped him like a sack of bricks and turned on his heels towards the guards. Lucius landed on his chest and had his eyes on the ground, unable to move under the weight of all that had just happened. He kept his back turned, and could not see the guards nor the assassin. To this day Lucius had no idea what exactly he had done to them. He only knew that he briefly heard gun fire, followed by screaming, and the distinct sound of flesh being torn from bone.

Lucius scrambled back to his feet and attempted to flee once again. With the elevator behind him, there was only one place left that he could think of. His office.

He had turned corner after corner to get there, not bothering this time to see if the assassin was following him. He had closed and locked the door for what it was worth, and then made for his desk. His first action was to press the silent alarm that connected him directly to the Batcave. Next was to pull his 9 mm from the drawer. The last was to get underneath the desk and hide.

That was how he found himself in his current position.

He knew Bruce would get there. He knew it. The only issue was staying alive long enough for that to matter now that he heard his door open.

There was low, soft footsteps at first. Like those of a dancer or small child. Someone light on their feet.

Next was a terrible noise that took Lucius a moment to recognize as someone's voice.

"I smell the flesh of the living."

Those words caused Lucius to pull back the hammer of his gun and place his finger above the trigger.

" _I_ can taste his fear."

It sounded like the same voice, but it was much closer now.

Lucius couldn't wait anymore. He threw caution to the wind and came up from under the large metal desk and pointed the gun ahead of him only...

Only there was nobody there.

Or so it first appeared.

Lucius made the mistake of relaxing his hold on the gun, only to hear a chuckle from _above_ him.

Lucius looked up just in time to see the assassin jump down from where he had been hanging from the ceiling, and suddenly it made sense how he had seemed to be in two places at the same time.

This wasn't one assassin, but _two_. Wearing identical uniforms. Both looked towards the gun unamused before one bated it from his hand just as they had done to the extinguisher just as Lucius raised it to take aim. It went off when it hit the wall and left a bullet to fly through the air and pierce one of the floor tiles.

"Now then," That voice from beyond the grave said as one of the assassins lurched forward and grabbed Lucius by his throat, lifting him above his desk before throwing him to the ground, causing him to slide and hit the door with a loud bang. "Where were we?"

"Oh yes." The other assassin offered in an identical voice as the two prowled towards him. "Lucius Fox, you have been weighed on the scales and found wanting. As such, the Court of Owls has sentenced you to die."

For the briefest of moments that seemed to be it. Everything that Lucius had accomplished in his life. Everything he could have gone on to accomplish. It was about to be rendered inert by one act of violence by a pair of psychotic individuals.

But when he was ready to make voice his final prayers and resign to his fate, a dark shadow passed over the large windows which made up the wall of his office behind the desk. Both assassins caught the shadow and looked back, only to be greeted by a pair of individuals smashing through the glass and landing well placed blows on their faces.

That was the second lesson Lucius learned that night.

Never give up on Batman, because he won't give up on you.

* * *

Batman and Robin were quick to action after they burst through the window and struck the assassins. Both knew what to do. Robin was to get Lucius to safety and rejoin Batman after that was done. Batman was to keep them busy while that happened.

Robin ran past the assassin he had kicked, and Batman went to keep both sets of eyes on him. He threw a batarang at said assassin, which he parried easily enough with his claws but it still caused him to look away from Robin and towards Batman.

Bruce immediately recognized their garb. The same as the assassin that had tried to kill him two weeks prior. But neither of them was that man. Wrong height and weight. But he could tell just by looking at them that they were no less dangerous.

Robin was already at Lucius' side, bringing the older man's arm around his shoulder so Jason could help him move. "Come on Luci. It's time we-"

"Bruce Wayne."

And those two words seemed to make time stop. All parties other than the assassins seemed to have the same reaction. All of them stopped what the were doing, their limbs froze up, and they turned to the one who had uttered it.

It was the assassin that Bruce had decked on his way in. The one that was currently staring at him. Jason could tell that Bruce was trying and failing to come up with a way to ask the assassin what he was talking about. There was little point in such a vain effort now.

Then the other assassin turned to Jason and Lucius. If there was any possibility that the three had all misheard him, the second assassin's next words completely obliterated it.

"Jason Todd." He continued in an identical voice.

Then together, the assassins spoke as one in a way that made it sound like there was an echo in the room. "The Court of Owls has sentenced you to die."

Bruce reacted quickly, throwing an additional two batarangs. One at either assassin. Both wiped around at the projectile and grabbed it in their claws. But an instant later, the explosives within the batarangs did what they were built for. They were specifically engineered not to kill, but to maim.

The resulting blast went off close to their chests and knocked both assassins against opposite walls, incapacitating them for a moment.

Batman looked to Robin, still in shock over what the mercenaries said. "Get Lucius out of here now!"

Jason tore his eyes away from the duo of killers and looked at his mentor. Readiness came back to him and he was back to helping Lucius get to his feet. Jason sparred a glance back to his adoptive father before the disappearing through the door.

Once they were gone, the battle began anew. The assassins both leapt from their positions on the floor at a moments notice and lunged towards Batman.

Bruce mind went to work while his body fought them off.

The first thing he took note of was that these two were not entirely human. The amount of speed and strength they displayed, while abnormal, could still fall within the range of human capabilities depending on their training. What could not be explained was the fact that they so easily recovered from an explosion that went off inches away from their chests and skulls. Even though they were meant to be nonfatal, it was still an explosive device. It should of seriously injured them, at the very least to the point that they wouldn't be able to move around as fluidly as they were. They must have been meta-humans, with some type of enhanced durability or extreme tolerance to pain.

The next was their techniques. The jabs and slashes and kicks against his armor were all too familiar. These assassins were using the same skill set that Nightwing displayed, just like the other assassin in black had. They also wore identical clothing to the assassin who tried to kill him, and even said the same words.

_"The Court of Owls has sentenced you to die."_

His mind also tugged at the thought of that first assassin. These two were different. Not only were they smaller in stature, but they were also weren't quite as proficient as the one who invaded the manor. They were not by any means amateurs. By all standards the two were still incredibly lethal killers, to the point that they had slaughtered armed security guards. But their skill levels differed from the first similar to the contrast between a master and an apprentice. It made sense to some degree. The person who contracted out to them wouldn't have thought it necessary to send their very best after a Lucius as opposed to Bruce Wayne.

Bruce Wayne...

That was the final and by far the most concerning thing about them. They knew who he was. More than that if they were attacking Lucius. That meant that they also knew who his allies were. Knowing the identity of Batman also meant knowing the identity of Robin and Nightwing. But for Lucius, there was nothing there. He had always made sure there was no paper trail to trace if God forbid someone found out who he was.

If they were able to find Lucius, who he had gone through painstaking work to protect, then they could find everyone else too. Selina, Barbara, Jim, all of them.

He couldn't spare another moment to dwell on that though. He had to keep to the battle at hand. A battle that was not going particularly well.

Even though the two were novices compared to the one who infiltrated Wayne Manor, they were still considerably deadly. It certainly didn't help the situation that there was two of them, nor that it was beginning to feel like fighting two Nightwings at once.

Nightwing was an incredible hero. But he didn't have the bulk or brute force of his mentor. He relied mainly on his acrobatic prowess and ability to dodge attacks rather than taking them. For these two, it was much more violent than that. While Nightwing always used his allotted openings to deliver a small jab or kick to the exposed area, these two came at him with claws.

Whenever Bruce blocked or parried the attack of one, the other was there in an instant to take full advantage of the opening said counter left. These two had clearly worked with one another for a long time, and relied heavily on the advantage in numbers and their teamwork to take down a target.

If he was to even the playing field, he needed Jason back here.

One of the assassins lashed out again with his claws and Bruce made a move to retreat from it. However, the other was already behind him and attempted to sweep his legs out from under him as he moved back. Once he did though, Bruce flipped backwards and dodged both attacks, landing in front of both assassins before throwing another pair of batarangs.

But then the assassins did something he wasn't prepared for. They grabbed onto the batarangs just as they had done before, but then spun around and threw them back at Bruce. The two explosives collided with the bat symbol on his chest and went off, the impact throwing Bruce against the wall.

The assassins had again pulled off what was otherwise an impossible achievement. The batarangs had pressure sensors on nearly ever inch of the blade. One would have to know exactly where to grip it, and how tightly to hold on. That took training from Bruce himself.

The two assassins were already making their move towards him, but Bruce was ready to get up and fight again. The armor was especially dense around the bat symbol, and as such protected him from the worst of the explosion.

But just as he stood up, two more projectiles flew through the air, planting themselves directly into the assassins' chests. They both seemed to be taken off guard by the new artillery that seemingly came out of nowhere.

But Bruce knew that wasn't the case. And despite what these two may have thought, they weren't batarangs. They were _birdarangs_.

Both made a motion to grab at the devices but both went off the moment they moved. Batman's eyes widened in a mixture of surprise and horror as the discharge of the bombs caused both to go flying towards the large office windows he and Robin had come in from before flying through them. Neither screamed, nor did they appear to make any move to slow their descent.

It wouldn't have mattered if they did. They were on the fifty eighth floor.

Perhaps half a minute after they fell out of Bruce's line of vision, he heard the distinct crush a metal and a sickening _splat_. He ran over to the window to look outside and confirm, only to close his eyes in shame. Even from this height, Bruce could tell.

Both had fallen. One of them had hit the sidewalk and was surrounded by a puddle of what must have been blood. The other had been pushed a few feet further and had landed directly on a car below. Bruce could just make out the shards of glass that had spilled into the street.

Opening his eyes and narrowing his white lenses into silts, Bruce turned around to face his protege.

Jason was shaking like a leaf in the wind from his position in the doorway where he had thrown the birdarangs from. He clearly hadn't been expecting the explosion to be so powerful, nor had he wanted it to push them out the window to their deaths. His face was painted with shock and horror and fear and disgust. He had never killed anyone before. Directly or otherwise. And yet...

He knew he would screw up this Robin thing to some degree. He had expected a fair amount of bumps and bruises along the way to perfecting it. But he never expected one of those mistakes to result in...

He looked up to Bruce, trying to find some sense of reassurance in his guardian. Instead, all he saw was disappointment. "Bruce...I..." (1)

"Follow me down. Now." Bruce said as he leapt from the window and extended his cape to glide down gently.

Jason was still shaking nervously. He nearly dropped his grapple gun. But sooner or later, the Boy Wonder was able to get the hook secured to the window's base and attach the cord to a latch on his belt. Jason then looked then nervously and gulped before kicking off against the ledge and slowly lowering himself down. It took some time because of how high up they were, but eventually he came down.

Bruce was already analyzing the scene. It was haunting just how familiar this situation was. Bruce's mind briefly flashed back to a different trope of acrobats, far more talented than these two had been. Their bodies had broken against the ground in a similar fashion. Their limbs bent at odd angles, and puddles of dark fluid forming around their bodies. Of course, their acrobatic talents weren't the only thing that set them apart from these men. They had also been remarkably better people, and a loving family. These assassins couldn't be farther removed from that.

But whoever they might have been, they didn't deserve to die.

Bruce made his way over to the other side of the car that one of them had landed on, analyzing the body as he did so. It was utterly broken. Like a puppet with it's strings cut. Not a single bone in the poor man's body appeared to have survived the fall. There were small cuts in the flesh here and there as well, where the sharp edges of metal from the car had cut through the uniform he wore. Bruce could see a small trickle of fluid beginning to run down the metal of the car. Blood, his mind told him. Only it wasn't red. It was pure black.

Interested in confirming his suspicions once and for all, Bruce continued making his way to the other end of the car where the assassin's head lay. There wasn't too much damage to the skull. It hadn't made contact with the car, and was hanging of the side like the branch of a dead tree. Bruce reached for the hood, gathering up a wade of the black fabric in his hand before yanking it back.

His heart stopped.

He had been correct, for what little it was worth now. They were indeed meta-humans. His appearance made that much evident.

His skin was completely white. Not in the ethnic sense, but completely drained off all color. That lack of pigment only served to make the highly visible black veins that crawled across his neck and face even more apparent. There was no color whatsoever in his lips or cheeks either. For a moment, it felt like he was staring at the body of someone who had been dead for weeks rather than minutes.

Even though his skin was devoid of any hue which might indicate race, Bruce could tell by his facial structure that he was Caucasian. A head of caramel brown hair had been awaiting him underneath that hood. It was in a high and tight style, much like a military officer. Buzzed on the sides and short on the top. Internally, Bruce was thankful to whatever higher power existed that the males' eyes were already shut.

But Bruce couldn't bring himself to care about the fact that they were metas, nor did his thoughts touch too deeply on the fact that their appearance was so unusual even by meta standards.

Because for God's sake...

He was just a _kid_.

That was perhaps an overstatement. He was no child. He was significantly older than Jason. But still, Bruce fixed his age at about where Dick currently was. Sixteen. Seventeen at most. Looking down at his bare sharp jawline, Bruce didn't think he even shaved.

Someone this young couldn't form the intent to be a cold blooded killer for hire. Someone had done this to him. Manipulated him. Turned a young boy into a monster.

Bruce turned to the body of the other assassin, and his heart broke into a million piece.

Jason was already there. He was standing over the body and had removed the hood himself.

The second body was in a similar position. It too had a puddle of black fluid forming around it in place of blood, and was broken in over a dozen different areas. When Bruce turned his gaze towards the assassin's face, it suddenly made sense why their voices had been identical.

They were either twins or clones.

It said something about his life that both possibilities were equally plausible.

They had the same hair, noses, brows, and sharp jaws. Identical in every way. Bruce was willing to bet twins based on the unspoken resonance that seemed to exist between them while they fought against him. Much like his brother his eyes were shut, but his neck was bent at a terrible angle and a shard of bone stuck out.

But that wasn't what broke Bruce heart.

It was Jason.

He was looking at the body with guilt and shame and-

Dear God.

 _The_ _body._

Jason had never seen a dead body before.

Bruce quickly maneuvered around the car again to get beside Jason. He knelt down, carefully avoiding the black blood that was seeping from the corpse and looked to his son.

Jason had his hand over his mouth, more to keep himself from being sick than from shock. Bruce could still make out his widened eyes through the white lenses of his domino. He had heard Jason muttering the beginnings of an apology when they were up in the office, but Bruce cut him off before he had the chance to finish.

Slowly, he brought a hand up to Robin's shoulder so as not to startle him. "Come with me. I don't want you to see this." He said, pulling lightly at Jason's shoulder to guide him away from the scene.

Jason lifted the hand away from his mouth and spoke, speech slurred and stuttered by panic. "Bruce...I...I didn't..."

"It was an accident." Batman interrupted as he gave Jason a more forceful tug to turn him around, now longer allowing him to look at the carnage. "It's okay Robin. It'll be okay."

Bruce meant it. He knew the law better than most. Not only was what Jason did unintentional, but he did it to keep the assassins away from Bruce and Lucius. That was use of deadly force to protect another person, which was completely justified under the law. It was the only concession Bruce ever made to his rule on killing. Victims were allowed to act in self defense to protect themselves and loved ones. And looking down at Jason, he had never seen someone look more like a victim.

Bruce got up after he turned Jason around and began to nudge him inside the building. He would have to call Gordon. Explain what had happened and why. Jim would understand. Jason never meant to-

"Bbrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrsssssssssssssssss."

Batman froze in his tracks, and a bolt of cold ran up his spinal column. Robin's back straightened and he stifled a shriek.

An eerie state passed over them. Suddenly, it felt like there were clawed hands on them, restraining their movements. Well, not restraining so much as attempting to have them turn. To confirm with their own eyes what their ears had just told them. Batman had long since attempted to prepare himself for anything and everything. But the thought of it shook even him.

It wasn't possible. It simply wasn't. That was a eight hundred foot drop straight down. Directly unto a car and a brick sidewalk. Even if someone were to survive the initial impact by some miracle, it wouldn't have been able to last for more than a few seconds. Quite frankly, it was a miracle their bodies were still in one piece. Even if he had been correct in his assumption that they had enhanced durability, the brain damage alone-

"Brrrruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuusssssssss...Wyyyynnn..."

The voice sounded as though it were being summoned from beyond the grave. It was horrible how tortured and raw the noise was. Nearly impossible to believe that it came from a human being.

But then, these two were far removed from human.

The Dynamic Duo finally gave into their urge to turn towards the source of the noise.

What they saw would long be imprinted on Jason's nightmares.

Even Bruce would be tormented by the images he was about to bare witness to.

It began with the assassin on the car. It started out small enough. His index finger began to twitch, and then one of his legs began to shake. Bruce was tempted to believe for a moment that what he was witnessing was simply a byproduct of death. It wasn't uncommon for newly dead corpses to suddenly twitch, or jolt, or even blink before rigor set in. The Dark Knight was quickly disillusioned when one of his arms, bent the wrong way so that his elbow was folded inwards, suddenly straightened out into a proper position with a sickening snap.

Then there was his brother, who laid just a few feet closer to them. His head was still at an odd angle with his neck when it began to bob back and forth to either side, almost like he was shaking his head to say 'no'. His head then violently threw itself into a position that realigned it with the neck and shoulders. The bone that had stuck out from the wound then slipped underneath his skin.

The assassin on the car moved again. This time, his newly restored arm snapped up and rammed back down unto what remained of the car's roof. The golden claws he wore gripped at the edge of the metal. Then, the assassin used his grip to actually throw himself forward, right unto the sidewalk next to his mirror image. He landed on his knees, which had apparently healed themselves between the time Bruce had last looked and when he had cast his gaze on the brother.

"Bruce...Wayne..."

It quickly formed into its' own little system. The assassin's limbs began to twitch on their own, only to miraculously pop back into their sockets and mend their shattered bones. Soon, the assassin that hit the pavement directly was on his feet. His legs moved upwards and then bent back while he still laid on the ground. His legs then moved down so that his boots were placed flat against the ground. Then, his entire upper body was lifted up just by the leverage on his heels on the ground. At first his body drooped forward like he was going to fall over again, and it really was like watching a marionette being lifted off the ground by its' strings. But soon enough, his back straightened and he was standing still.

The other assassin who had pushed himself on the ground healed the rest of his internal injuries. With that done Bruce could see the tears in his skin, which he had taken note of earlier, were also sealing up. Once he was completely restored, the assassin got up one leg at a time and stood in the same still position as the other.

The two stood there, completely still for a moment. Taking the time to look them over for some manner of explanation to what he had just witnessed, Bruce discovered something else entirely. Their eyes. They hadn't opened their eyes once during the entire process of putting their bodies back together. It was almost as though their bodies were under the control of some otherworldly force, and their conscious minds had left them.

Not long after the thought came to him though both sets of lids parted and revealed the eyes underneath, treating Bruce to yet another surprise.

Their sclera was were completely white, just like their skin. There was no red. No signs of blood vessels whatsoever. The pupils were extremely small, as though they had just been forced under an incredibly bright light. They reminded Bruce of a predatory bird staring down its' prey. But the color...the color was most disturbing.

They were yellow. A disgusting inhuman yellow. A shade of which that spoke of wickedness and evil. The eyes actually seemed to glow in the darkness.

There was a long standing myth that the eyes were the windows to the soul. Bruce was an extreme realist. He never bought into superstition of any sort. But much like his rule on killing, this also has an exception.

When you looked at Dick or Clark's eyes, you could see the warmth and care and love there. When you looked into Jason's blue and green orbs, you were gazing into mischief and a knack for getting into trouble. In Alfred's eyes, you could always find unquestionable loyalty and compassion.

Bruce was different though.

In Bruce's eyes, it was like trying to see your reflection in stone. His walls of iron that protected him and kept him from dealing with anything emotional also shut out any type of reading.

The eyes of these boys were similar, but at the same time different.

He looked into their eyes and he saw nothing. It wasn't that they had their defenses up to keep the enemy from gagging them. They had no emotional guard up at all. Bruce saw nothing past the yellow. No emotion. No conscience.

No soul.

There were a number of tests he would have to run at a later time to confirm it, but just by looking at their eyes Bruce had his answers.

The reason they hadn't died in the fall...

...it was because they were _already dead_.

"Bruce Wayne." They repeated once more in unison as they flexed out their fingers and extended their claws. "The Court of Owls has sentenced you to die."

They leapt into action before anyone could blink, as though falling off one of the highest floors of the tower was now a distant memory.

Each one went after a member of the Dynamic Duo. They even had the foresight to split them up. The one who had tumbled off the car leapt into the air and lashed out at Bruce with his claw. When Bruce sidestepped to avoid it, the assassin made a slight adjustment and landed on his clawed hand while keeping the rest of his body upright. While still in that handstand he then kicked out towards Bruce, a small blade popping out of the toe of his boot as he did so. He managed to just a get a scrape in on Bruce's clavicle as Batman made a move to dodge that as well. The knife exacted the smallest stream of blood from the wound in triumph as the assassin flipped back over to land on his feet, coming after Bruce again. The attacks were oriented towards getting him to move in the opposite direction of Robin.

Meanwhile, the other went after Jason with vengeance in his eyes. As he ran towards the young boy, Jason threw a pair of birdarangs at him in an effort to delay his approach. When they were nearly close enough to strike him, the assassin shifted his running into a cartwheel which left the projectiles to fly through the air without making contact. He then leapt up from the cartwheel and attempted to land on Jason with his claws outstretched. Jason wasn't nearly the acrobat that Nightwing was, but he was able to do a back flip that landed him on the hood of a nearby car. This left the assassin's attack to aimlessly hit the ground.

Jason wasn't sure what to expect next, but he could say with absolute certainty that he hadn't been prepared for the assassin to quickly extend one of his legs underneath the car and then _flip it over_ with a kick. Jason managed to jump off it just in time, as the car was flipped through the air and then landed on its' hood. As he landed on the ground, the assassin was already after him. When he was within range Jason through a punch only for the assassin to flip over his head and land behind him. The assassin then grabbed a handful of his cape and yanked it back, causing Jason to stumble. While one hand held the cape, the other curled into a fist and collided with the back of Jason's head. Jason let out a sharp cry as he was suddenly knocked off his feet and made to land forward. Before he could hazard getting up, the assassin planted a knee on the center of his back, and slung the cape back in front of Jason's face and under his head. He then gave it another sharp pull while Jason kicked about violently, being strangled with his own cape.

Bruce wasn't holding up much better. He was experiencing a psychological hurdle from fighting someone so _young_. His reflexes were dulled, and his movements sluggish. The assassin had no such qualms though.

Another concern was that Bruce had no idea what the full range of the boys' powers were. Clearly he could heal and he had durability, but he also got the sense that his speed, strength, and senses had been heightened as well.

As Bruce cataloged both his natural talent for agility and flexibility as well as those gifts bestowed on him by his powers, Bruce couldn't help but wonder where these kids came from. Gotham had its' fair share of killers, but relatively speaking very few of the city's villains were metas. Far more often it was just regular humans whose brains had been were wired wrong from birth. And among the subcategory of villains who possessed powers, not one of them had the capability to fall four hundred feet and then simply shrug it off. Whatever this was, it was something he had never encountered before.

Eventually, something abruptly interrupted his train of thought. While both he and the assassin continued to trade blows, neither giving an inch, a white cloud of mist suddenly sprayed out from the side and covered assassins' form. He let out an inhuman screech before jumping away.

Bruce looked to the source of the blast, and was surprised to see Lucius standing there with a fire extinguisher in his hands. He must have left the panic room within Wayne Enterprises that Robin had previously escorted him to. "Lucius, what are you doing here?! You need to get out of here now!" He said alarmed, gripping his friend by the shoulders.

"I had to help." Lucius replied, not seeming to care about his safety at the moment. "Listen to me. I-"

"No!" Bruce yelled. "These things are after you! You need to get back to the panic room and stay there until-!"

"Bruce!" Lucius said, knowing full well that addressing the man by his real name while in uniform would get him to be quiet for just a moment. Lucius was quick to seize the opportunity to point to where the assassin had fled. "Look!"

Bruce followed where Lucius was pointing, and found himself utterly shocked for the third time that night. The assassin...

...he was _cowering_.

Bruce could just make out his form from behind a car where he was hiding. His hands gripped the edges of the metal and his head was just peaking out from over the curve of the trunk. Bruce could see his entire form shaking violently, and his yellow eyes were glaring at the red device in Lucius' hands.

Suddenly, the deadly killer that had been trying to take his life was gone. In his place stood a frightened child.

"He did the same thing in the office." Lucius said as he made a gesture for Bruce to take the extinguisher. "I don't know what causes it, but it works."

Bruce looked down to examine it. It was a newer model that the company had invented. A custom CO2 extinguisher. It could dose any fire in minutes. The extreme cold both worked to extinguish the fire itself as well as deprive it of oxygen to completely smother the flames.

Batman let himself ponder the modifications on it for another moment or two before he looked back to the assassin, something just occurring to him.

The assassin wasn't shaking in terror as he once believed. He was shivering.

And according to Lucius, he had done this before.

That was it. Every meta human with powers so great had a key weakness as well. Superman had kryptonite. Martian Manhunter had fire.

And this assassin had the cold.

He could tell by the weight of the canister that the extinguisher was close to being empty, so that was out as an option. But lately, Bruce had been developing a new form of batarang that might do the trick. It was similar enough to his other designs on its' face, but it did have one key difference. Within the interior of the weapon was a mechanism for injecting a combination of CO2 and liquid nitrogen. He had actually gotten the idea from Mr. Freeze. He had been hoping to use it against Poison Ivy, Firefly, or perhaps Clayface for a test run but-

His thoughts were cut short when the assassin pounced into action once again. His aversion to the cold seemed to be temporarily overpowered by blood lust, as he quickly realized who it was that Batman was conversing with.

"Lucius Fox will perish! And so shall the house of Wayne!" He screamed as he ran towards them.

Batman got into a fighting stance and placed himself between the assassin and Lucius and he took out his experimental batarang. He couldn't risk throwing it after the assassins caught his explosives. So he would essentially have to stab the boy with the sharp edge.

He moved like Nightwing. They all did. It was something that had startled Batman at first. But now he could use it to his advantage.

Batman knew the way Nightwing fought better than anyone. And based on the boy's posture as he ran, he could tell that he intended to take a flying leap over Bruce's head to get to Lucius. And when he did just that, Bruce was ready. He reached up in the instant the assassin was above his head and grabbed one of his legs, before using it to slam him into the ground. The assassin groaned and had clearly broken something, so Bruce had to act before it healed. He came down on the assassin with the batarang in hand and impaled him in the shoulder.

The assassin's eyes widened, no doubt feeling a cold jolt pass through his body. He brought up his now mended arm and clocked Bruce right in the jaw before rolling to the side to get out from under him. The punch did little to no damage though. The assassin got to his feet and tore the batarang from his shoulder, black sludge pouring from the wound before it closed up as well. It didn't matter though. The batarang was designed to inject the target the moment it pierced the skin.

It started with the assassin's brows knitting in worry and what looked like fear. It seemed to make him look so much younger. Then his eyes widened greatly as he stared down at the wound site. His whole form began to shake uncontrollably, and soon he was on his knees. Bruce could see the black veins on his neck and face beginning to change. They lightened in shade, turning a light blue as the liquid nitrogen passed through his bloodstream. He pressed his hands to the place where the batarang had pierced him and made a choking sound before he fell over on his side. Bruce then watched as a small amount of frost crawled up from the skin underneath his suit, and the assassin opened his mouth as if to say something. But when he did, all that came out was a thin cloud of pale mist from the cold. His eyes seemed to roll over after that, and his body went lax.

Meanwhile, the second assassin was still attempting to strangle the life out of Jason with his cape.

Jason was putting up a fight to pry the assassin's hands off, or perhaps to tear the fabric of the cape, but nothing worked. Damn Bruce for making it out of such a thick material.

Most people would have been helpless in that scenario. Certainly Dick would have been doomed in his early days as Robin, considering he had been significantly shorter than Jason was when he was twelve.

But luckily, he wasn't Dick Grayson. He was Jason Todd.

And Jason Todd fought dirty.

He brought up his lower leg so it was folded inwards so that his calf was practically touching his hamstring. Once that was done, he kicked it out like a spring that had been coiled too tight...

...landing a firm kick on the assassin's groin.

Jason smirked in triumph as he heard a high pitched sound echo through the assassin's throat and his grip around the cape weakened. Jason then managed to struggle enough so that the assassin's knee came off his back, and he was able to turn. When he did, he elbowed the assassin right in the jaw as he passed. Jason felt glee run through him as something white flew out of the assassin's mouth, which must have been a tooth.

Jason then tore his cape from the assassin's grip and kicked him again in the side, knocking him over. While Jason took a few steps back to admire his handy work, the assassin glared fiercely at him and attempted to get up. But as he did so, a batarang flew past Jason's ear and nailed the assassin in the center of the chest with deadly accuracy.

The assassin looked down at it with wide eyes and made a move to pry it from his chest, but it was too deeply driven in. Soon, he experienced the same effects as his partner. His black veins turned blue, his body began to seize up, and he was on the ground with his breath coming out in the form of white mist.

Jason turned back to Bruce, who had Lucius by his side. While Bruce seemed to be drinking it in with prying eyes, Lucius seemed more than a bit startled by the whole ordeal. Understandably so.

"B...?" Jason said as he turned between the two paralyzed assassins. The one closest to him had stopped releasing breath from his mouth, and the other's eyes were glazed over. "Are they...dead?"

"No." Batman said firmly. "Their vitals are weak, but holding steady."

Bruce then looked between the two assassins as well. Then to Lucius, then to Jason. He made a choice quick.

He turned again to Lucius. "Head inside and call the police. Tell them what happened, but tell them that the assassins escaped. And Lucius, they can know that Batman was here but-"

"I'm well aware." Lucius said, placing a reassuring hand on Bruce's shoulder. "No one so much as said a word that sounded like Bruce Wayne."

Batman nodded firmly, and with that Lucius went back inside to call it in.

Batman then turned to his protege, who was still looking at everything like he couldn't believe what had taken place that night. "Load them into the car. We'll study them back at the cave."

Jason looked up to Bruce wearily and nodded, already moving to lift up the man who had just tried to kill him.

Bruce's eyes continued to study the scene. From the crushed car to the black blood splatter. Finally, he noticed something of interest. The molar that Jason had knocked out of the assassin's mouth. Bruce walked over and picked it up off the ground, examining it. When he turned it over to the side, he could tell right away that something was wrong. There were no cracks or roots on the bottom of the tooth. It broke off far too cleanly. It must have been a false tooth.

Batman turned it over again, and glared at what he found there. Wedged within the cavity of the tooth, sat a small golden coin...

...with the emblem of an owl with its wings spread far.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (1) This is a shout out to Batman #424, where Jason confronts a criminal on his balcony who subsequently falls to his death. It is left unclear whether or not he fell or Jason pushed him.
> 
> Please subscribe, give kudos, and PLZ comment and tell me what you thought. ;)


	3. Before the Court

_Ten Days Later_

It started out like any other night. Jim Gordon had just finished up some paper work and put some new files on top of the ever growing stack within his drawer. He was more than prepared to go home and see his daughter when the lights cut out.

He had looked around then. Some of the lights were flickering to get back on. Something was wrong with the power. That wasn't particularly something new. Mayor Hady never really saw the Police Department as 'an essential service' so rolling blackouts in the station were not terribly uncommon. And they wondered why Gotham was the home of violent crime.

It wasn't immediately concerning...until he smelled the smoke.

It was a familiar odor. He knew it by heart after investigating multiple arson cases and one particularly terrifying instance when eight year old Barbara was playing with matches. But it was not a scent that should have been coming from the inside of the station.

He looked up, and through the blinds of the window of his office he could clearly see red and orange light dancing behind the white folds. Gordon shot up from his desk and ran towards the door. Once he thrust it open, he could see one of the desks in the main space was being consumed by fire. Auxiliary officers were already scrambling to put it out, but Jim caught Bullock by the arm as he ran by. "What the hell happened?!"

"No idea! After the lights went out someone threw a Molotov cocktail through the open window." Bullock explained hurriedly, letting out a small sigh of relief when he saw officers in the corner of his eye grab the fire extinguisher and subsequently dousing the desk.

But Gordon only looked more alarmed by his explanation. The lights going out couldn't have been a coincidence. And the sprinkler system should have turned on the moment smoke rose. That mean someone had cut both their water and power.

He barely got time to wrap his head around it. Soon, the sound of glass being shattered penetrated his thoughts and he was made to turn around again, just in time to see a flaming glass bottle being chucked through the newly broken window and landing on a desk stacked with files with a crash. Some unlucky detective just lost a year's worth of case notes.

Officers were already running over with the extinguisher when something else came in through the window. This time, Gordon made out what looked like a taloned hand tossing the object in question from outside the window.

The object landed on the floor, and everyone prepared themselves for it to go up in flames. However, Jim took a moment to look it over. It wasn't a bottle like the others. It was a small black metallic tube with red outlines on either end. But far more apparent were the lit wicks that also appeared on either end. Gordon knew by the look of it that it was far worse than a Molotov.

"Everyone get down!" He yelled as he pushed Bullock down behind a nearby desk and jumped to take cover himself. A moment passed, and sharp _pop_ blasted through the room, followed in haste by the sounds of screaming.

Gordon hesitantly looked up from behind the desk, only to find the immediate area around where the device had been was completely consumed in fire. The only evidence that there had once been desks there were the scattered metallic piece which now lay in ruin about the floor.

That hadn't been any mere cocktail. It was an incendiary device, made by a professional. And this wasn't a gang or some punks on the street. It was an attack.

Gordon already made haste to the nearest window and yanked it open, gesturing for his fellow officers to follow. "Through here! It leads to the fire escape!"

Everyone bustled to get through and follow their commissioner. But as Bullock passed, Jim had a few words to spare. "Call the fire department. I'll get to the signal."

Bullock nodded before squeezing through the window frame. Once everyone was out and Gordon looked around, satisfied that no one had been left behind, he went through the window as well. But rather than use it to go down, he went up.

Once Gordon was on the roof, he dashed to the Batsignal with mad haste. Someone was attacking their department directly, and they wouldn't get away with it. But once he was within a foot of it, the clang of metal forced him to turn his head in the direction of the sound.

Right there, just a few inches away from his left leg, was another explosive identical to the last. Right down to the flames burning down the wick.

Gordon turned on his heel with alarm and ran, but not quick enough.

Suddenly, he was knocked back by a powerful surge of air and fire as the bomb went off. It felt like being rammed from behind by a stampede. The force knocked him forward until his face landed flat against the roof.

Before he could even attempt to get up, his body did its best to adapt to what just took place. His whole torso felt like a bell that had just been rung with a sledgehammer, and his head felt like he was just coming down from the most vicious of hangovers. Probably concussed if the ringing in his ears was anything to go by. He could barely hear the sirens of what must have been fire trucks over it.

Slowly, Gordon managed to turn on his side and crane his neck as best he could. The Batsignal had taken a much worse hit than him. It was on its' side, and the glass surrounding the signal was shattered. The bat itself was tilting out of it, only encased by a fair bit of welding on one side which had somehow managed to survive the blast.

But his attention was quickly captured by something else. A figure moving in the shadows. For a moment he thought with hope that it was Batman, but when he turned himself onto his back in order to look ahead, his hopes were effectively crushed.

He couldn't make out much. The light behind them from the fires and alarms obscured their forward features. But he could clearly make out the knife in their hand, and a pair of orange orbs situated where their eyes would have been.

He could just make out their voice above the ringing, and it took him a moment to realize that the inhuman sound was not due to his injury. Rather that was simply the way their voice sounded. (1)

"James Gordon, the Court of Owls has sentenced you to die."

Gordon's damaged head swarmed with thoughts. He had been correct. This was a hit. But was this always meant to be the endgame? Had they set the station ablaze just to lore him to the signal?

Whoever they were, they had been watching long enough to know that Gordon wouldn't trust anyone else to light the signal.

They had already begun to move his way. Gordon tried to get up, but when he moved he realized that his leg must have been damaged as well. Pain shot through it the moment he put pressure on his leg and he fell over once more. He only just managed to look back up at the assassin as they drew closer.

As he further observed the assassin, he could finally see it. A petite and feminine shape to their figure.

The assassin was a woman.

She had a cape flowing behind her. On the inside that touched her back it was the color of freshly spilled blood. On the outside that faced the rest of the world it was pure black. Around the collar were decorative feathers layered out in a type of ornament that encased her neck. The feathers were just spaced out evenly enough so that the attire as a whole was not bulky, but there were still just enough to tell they were there. The rest of her attire consisted of some type of skintight fabric which was also black, and she wore some type of hood or helmet that covered her head. The soft orange light that he had mistook for her eyes were actually a pair of goggles. He could also make out slim claws attached to the fingers of her gloves.

His head was killing him, and black spots were beginning to decorate his vision. Staying conscious at that point was like trying to climb a wall of ice. But he would never have it said that James Gordon went down without a fight.

He made a slow movement towards his side to get his service revolver, keeping his movements slight enough so that she might not notice. But just when he was ready to lay the flat of his palm against the handle, a new figure arrived on the seen.

Again, his immediate thoughts were drawn to Batman once his eyes caught sight of the black cape and pointed ears above a cowl. But again, he was caught off guard when a rather slight figure rammed into the assassin's side boots first, delivering a kick that sent her rolling across the roof and slamming against the stone railing. His next thought was the Boy Wonder, but he was instead caught off guard by a shock of red hair that flowed down the cape.

Gordon couldn't be bothered with why the figure looked so familiar before the darkness overtook him and he passed out.

* * *

Batgirl turned to her father just long enough to make sure he was okay before turning back to the assassin that tried to kill him. She looked just in time to see the assassin kick her legs up in the air to perform a kip up, which she then executed flawlessly.

Batgirl made a mental note that she would have to find a way to lure the assassin to another location. Otherwise, she risked her father getting caught in the crossfire. That would mean getting close to the skilled assassin who was currently brandishing a knife at her. She hadn't been Batgirl for very long at that point, but this was not the time to back down or doubt herself. This assassin had made things personal by coming after her father.

But before Barbara could make her first move, the assassin threw something at her. At first she was expecting a knife or another bomb, and took care to lift up her cape and duck beneath it so that her shock absorbent suit would take the brunt of the blast. But it was neither. Instead, the object ignited into a blinding white light that Batgirl's cape did nothing to shield her eyes against. A flash bomb. She stumbled back, temporarily blinded.

It came before she knew what hit her. A kick to the stomach, followed by an elbow to the jaw. Each hit felt like the kickback of a shotgun. The armor that lay beneath her suit was doing little to soften the blows. This assassin was incredibly strong for her size. And it didn't stop there. Next Batgirl's legs were swept out from under her, and she was grabbed by the throat before she could even fall. The assassin propelled her towards the side of the building, sending her through the stone rails.

Luckily her suit was able to absorb the initial impact. However, it still left Barbara to fall from the top of the building. She was reflexive enough to pull her grapple gun and shoot it before she got past the second floor window. She knew it was a bad idea, but couldn't resist the temptation to look down.

A large part of the first floor was on fire. It had begone to spread to the back alley that she was hanging above. While there were still parts of the alley that hadn't been touched, she couldn't guarantee that she would land on a safe zone if she were to fall. Looking for additional options, Batgirl turned her gaze upwards only to find the assassin glaring over the edge and looking down at her.

What a fine choice. A potentially fatal altercation if she went up, and a fiery death if she fell.

The assassin nearly made that choice for her, as Barbara almost let go of the grapple in shock once she spoke.

She began by letting out a low chuckle that was so deep one wouldn't expect to hear it from the female vocal range. When she did speak, it was like listening to a person whose throat had been cut. "My my. Fortune has seen fit to favor me. I was sent out to kill one Gordon. What an act of fate that I have been delivered a second."

Batgirl's eyes widened and her grip slipped the tiniest amount, and at that moment all she could think about was how lucky she was that her father was unconscious.

She _knew_? How could she know? Babs hadn't been Batgirl long enough for it to warrant an investigation. Not like Batman or Nightwing or-

And her already dreadful thoughts were abruptly cut off by a new set. If this assassin knew who she was, did she know about Bruce and the others too?

Such thoughts had to be pushed aside when the assassin took out her knife again and knelt down to the side of the wall, reaching for the rope that was keeping Barbara up.

Fiery death it was then.

Batgirl kicked against the wall just as the assassin cut the line, allowing herself to get a fair amount of distance between herself and the fire. Once she landed in the alley and was able to look back up to the assassin, who was no doubt glaring behind her goggles, Barbara let herself wonder what the assassin would do next. She could take a longer way down through the fire escape to continue their fight or, Barbara realized with horror, turn around and kill her father now that they were on the roof alone.

However, the assassin seemed to forget about Jim for the time being. She had a new target in sight.

She began by taking a flying leap off the edge of the railing. Batgirl naturally assumed she had lost her mind, until the assassin grabbed a hold of the horizontal arm of a nearby light post as she fell. Using it as a gymnastics bar in a fashion that seemed extremely familiar to the Dark Squire, she performed a perfect flyaway move and landed on the ground with ease.

Before she could even process what she had just seen, Batgirl was being attacked again. The assassin was incredibly fast. Not a speedster, but by no means human. She delivered some quick jabs to Batgirl's side, which the newest member of the Batclan attempted to counter with a kick to the head. But when she made her move, the assassin did a backwards handspring to dodge it. It was like trying to fight an Olympic gymnast.

But the fight was over just as quickly as it started. Just as the assassin ran towards Batgirl to inflict more damage, a white beam of sorts struck her from the side, emerging from the darkness of the alley. Batgirl had to look away due to the brightness, but could clearly hear her scream as the beam made contact. When she hesitantly looked back, she was greeted by the sight of her would be killer, now completely encased in ice.

When Batgirl's wide blue eyes turned to face the source of the beam, she was greeted by the sight of her mentor standing further down the alley with a grimmer expression than usual, and a device in the shape of a blaster that no doubt belonged to Victor Fries at one point in his hand.

"We need to talk."

* * *

They had gotten into the Batmobile and loaded the frozen assassin into the storage chamber of the car soundly enough. Batman told her to leave the fire to the proper authorities, and assured her that paramedics had already been sent up to her father and that he would be fine. It was immediately after his foot hit the gas that the questions began.

"What the hell just happened?" She asked with her heart still pounding. So much had just happened in the span of a few minutes. An assassin had lit the police department on fire, tried to kill her father, revealed that she knew Batgirl's identity, nearly killed her, then was frozen and perhaps even killed by Batman. It was too much to even attempt to wrap her head around.

"I know that you're upset right now-" Batman began before Barbara cut him off.

" _'_ _Upset?'_ " She repeated.

"But I need you to remain calm." He finished as though she had never interrupted him.

"Calm? _Calm?_ " She repeated, panic growing in spite of his order. "What the _hell_ is happening? Who was that woman? Is she...?"

Bruce's eyes narrowed into silts at the unasked question. "She's alive...in a manner of speaking." He said, knowing full well that such an answer would only lead to more questions. Regardless, he didn't want to hear that question completed. It was a logical thing to ask. Many of Freeze's victims died because his devices sent their core temperatures plummeting. But he still couldn't bare to hear that accusation.

Before she had the opportunity to voice any other concerns, Batman put the car on autopilot to turn to her in the passenger seat. "Listen to me Barbara. I know this is all new to you but I need you to calm down. I'm at least partially responsible for this. I should have told you about this sooner. I'll give you a complete debrief now, but not if you don't stop panicking."

Right. Barbara could do that. Getting your emotions under control was the primary part of Batman's training regimen. Barbara took in a deep breath before letting it leave her lungs. She was understandably still shaken. Not only had someone tried to kill her father, but they also knew who she was. Batgirl took in another breath, letting these facts pass from her mind as she did so.

She couldn't deal with that right now. She had to look at it objectively. This was any other case. Barbara Gordon hadn't just been fighting someone who tried to kill her father. Batgirl had fought someone who tried to kill Commissioner Gordon. One final breath and her nerves settled at last. She looked back up to Batman, who looked at her with anticipation. She nodded in assurance. "I'm okay."

Batman nodded back before taking the wheel again. "We'll start with the attack. This one wasn't the first of its' kind. The first attack took place at Wayne Manor. Someone tried to kill Bruce Wayne in his sleep."

Batgirl felt tension in her shoulders rise again at that. While she wasn't at all surprised to hear that her mentor had nearly been murdered, as it was something that happened every night, it did come as a surprise that it happened to his civilian persona. Referring to his civilian name in the third person was not so much a way of distancing himself from the event as it was highlighting the severity of what took place. "Any injuries?"

"None beyond the usual. The assassin was dressed in the exact same manner as the one who just went after Gordon. He was pushed back and retreated, but not before he left behind a knife with a strange metallic residue on it. The liquid metal we discovered on the knife turned out to be electrum."

Barbara nodded slowly, running the information over in her mind. Electrum was a metallic alloy, formed from a composite of silver and gold. She didn't quite see how that related to the matter at hand though.

"Not long after, Lucius Fox was attacked as well in the Wayne Enterprises building. Two assassins somehow got through fifty eight floors worth of security systems and killed Lucius' assistant, along with several security guards. When Robin and I arrived on the scene, the assassins addressed us.....by our given names."

Batgirl looked to her mentor again, blue eyes wide, while he continued to look forward with his face set in its' usual grim state. "My assassin mocked the fact that she would get to kill two Gordons instead of one. Have we been compromised?"

Batman nodded firmly. "It would appear so. And the fact that they went after Lucius and Gordon, both allies of Batman and one the father of Barbara Gordon, suggests that they know much more about us then just our names and faces."

Batgirl sat back in her seat to drink the information in. How had this happened? Batman went through rigorous methods to ensure their identities were a secret that was near impossible to discover. He became even more protective of identities after Jason and herself entered the fold. But somehow not only did someone discover their identities, they also became aware of their allies like her father and Lucius.

The last thought made her pause. Bruce hadn't told her what the outcome of the attack of Lucius was. And she hadn't seen him for a few days now. "Is Lucius-"

"He's fine." Batman said, cutting her off. "I'm keeping him off the grid until this is all sorted out. I also convinced Alfred that now would be a good time to visit his cousin in England."

Batgirl raised a brow beneath her cowl. "He agreed to that?"

"Define 'agreed'." Batman said curtly. "They're in more danger than you could possibly imagine. I had to take the choice out of their hands. Over the course of the battle with the assassins at Wayne Enterprises, both of them were knocked out the window and fell fifty eight stories."

Barbara gasped at the sudden declaration and covered her mouth with a glove. "Oh my God."

"That's what I thought until I went down just in time to see them get up off the ground and walk it off." He continued. Barbara was so floored by the simple explanation that she stayed silent as Batman went on. "I examined them after we got them secured and back to the cave. The electrum wasn't from their weapons. It was in their _blood_. When prepared in a certain manner and stimulated with electricity, electrum has the ability to reanimate dead tissue. When applied to these mercenaries, it means that torn flesh mends itself and broken bones reset, all within a matter of moments."

Batgirl nodded slowly. There were certainly some unorthodox heroes and villains in the world, but this was something else. Something that spat in the face of the laws of nature. "You're saying they can't be killed?"

"I'm saying that they heal themselves. As for their status of living...that's another matter entirely." Batman said, keeping his eyes on the road in an effort to keep himself distracted. "The electrum in their bloodstream came from a coin inserted in a tooth just above the gum line. It appears that the purpose is to administer small amounts over a long period of time. Based on how their physiology works, I think the electrum was activated posthumously."

Batgirl gave Batman a look. "They came back from the dead?"

"Not quite. The electrum only reactivates certain aspects of the body. Brain functions and a handful of others. Otherwise, they clinically register as dead. They have no pulse. They're breathing borders on nonexistent. The reason they won't die..."

Barbara picked up when she saw Bruce was unwilling to finish the thought. "It's because they're already dead."

Batman nodded, grateful to her for saying it for him. The very thought of it made even his skin crawl. "The electrum ceases to function in extreme cold though."

"Hence the need for Freeze's gun." She surmised. Again he nodded in confirmation. "But why specifically go after these people?"

"I never said that their list of targets was limited to myself, Lucius, or your father. Those are just the ones we managed to prevent. There were others that I didn't know about until after the fact. Eleven Gotham officials are dead. The police have held back the press so far, so only the immediate family members of the victims were informed."

Batgirl sighed through her nose. She knew that Batman couldn't stand it when he failed to save someone, no matter how unrealistic the circumstances were. But he seemed especially concerned over their deaths. Quickly coming up with a theory as to why, Batgirl immediately tested it. "Bruce Wayne know any of the victims personally?"

"Every single one." He said, the tone of his voice not changing by a decibel.

That certainly seemed to factor into his current mode, but Batgirl was the best detective in the Batclan after him. This wasn't the typical level of brooding, and it wasn't caused by the death of his public friends. Not entirely anyway. Something else was going on.

She was tempted for a moment to believe that it concerned Dick, since Bruce's ward was often the only thing that could get him this upset, but she quickly dismissed the thought. They hadn't spoken in months. Barbara was sure she would have heard about it from Jason or Alfred if they had.

Seeing no obvious alternative, she decided to confront him in a more or less hostile fashion. "There's something else going on. Something you haven't mentioned. You can keep it a secret if you want, but I'll just find out from Jason or Alfred."

Batman glared at the road ahead and gripped the wheel just a little bit tighter. He didn't like it when his proteges challenged him. But, he was acutely aware of Barbara's abilities as a detective and he didn't want her wasting her time, first by figuring out what he was hiding and then by chasing what must have been a dead end. He let out a low groan before answering. "The three assassins I faced all claimed that they were sent by the Court of Owls."

Barbara's eyes perked up slightly in recognition of the old title. Like every other child of Gotham, she had grown up being frightened by that horrid children's story before growing up to realize it was an urban legend. Staring off through the car window on her side, she absentmindedly began to recite the story. "Beware The Court of Owls, that watches all the time, ruling Gotham from a shadowed perch, behind granite and lime. They watch you at your hearth, they watch you in your bed, speak not a whispered word of them, or they'll send-"

"A Talon for your head." Bruce cut in. "I'm familiar with the rhyme."

"I always thought they were just a legend."

"They are." Bruce responded, his voice firm and unmovable.

Batgirl gave him a questioning look in kind. "But you just said-"

"I said they _claimed_ they were sent by the Court of Owls." Bruce said, cutting her off one last time.

Barbara narrowed her eyes in annoyance, but let it slide. Clearly Bruce didn't like the thought of Court of Owls existing. She understood why. Believing in such a thing would mean relinquishing control over Gotham to a lesser degree. He would have to admit that there was something else out there that had just as much control over the fate of the city as himself. Perhaps even more so. But before confronting him on that, she had to see what she could do to pry out more information. "Fine. If they don't actually exist, then can I safely assume there's no harm in asking you some questions about them?"

"Go ahead." He said. He knew full well that giving leave to ask whatever one wanted was a rare occurrence in their so called 'batclan', but he wanted her to have the right information. Maybe then she would see the Court for the myth it was and they could put this behind them.

"Well, what do you know about them? The legend I mean. Beyond the rhyme?"

Even though the Court of Owls was essentially the boogeyman of Gotham which everyone seemed to know about, there was supposedly a long story behind the rhyme itself. It was hard to know for sure. Whenever she conducted a search in the past, Barbara was only ever able to find that rhyme. Author and date unknown. And yet, it seemed to be a corner stone of the city. It was just as much a part of Gotham as the gargoyles.

Batman thought for a moment before responding. He first heard of the Court of Owls from his father. Thomas Wayne used to read that story to his son before he fell asleep. After that, it had been a type of taunt for children. 'Don't misbehave, or the Court of Owls will send their Talon for you'. It was in his teenage years when he was looking into his parents' murder that he finally heard the story that he was now passing on to Batgirl. "The Court is supposedly an organization that watches over Gotham. Pulling the strings of those in power from behind the curtain, and actively deciding the fate of all those who dwell within the city."

"And the Talon?" As a child, Barbara thought it simply meant the owl's claws. But when one looked at the rhyme close enough, you could see that the Talon was being personified, as though it were a separate being.

"Talon is supposedly their assassin. Some versions of the story say he sold his soul to eternally cheat death. Others say he's the angel of death himself."

That sounded pretty consistent with the way these assassins were able to heal from virtually any injury. Despite how the facts lined up with the legend in that sense, Bruce still didn't seem convinced. Annoyed, Barbara pressed him a bit harder. "And you've never found any evidence that the Court of Owls or this Talon exist?" She asked, a tad of sarcasm laid into her tone. Four assassins in total certainly seemed to give the story at least _some_ credence.

Batman groaned again, frustrated that Batgirl wasn't letting it go as he had hoped. "The legend has existed since the city was founded, but there's never been any hard evidence to support a claim to their existence. As for the Talon, he's just a ghost story. Local legends have credited murders to the Talon over the last four hundred years. I think you'll find that staying alive that long is a rather difficult task."

He had hoped by explaining to her just how absurd the concept was, she would final see the Owls for the myth that they were. Nothing but a story to scare Gotham's youth. Why didn't she seem to grasp it?

Barbara was in a similar state of frustration with her mentor's ability to overlook the possibilities. "Ra's al Ghul, Vandal Savage, Doctor Fate. Those names mean anything to you? All of them have lived much longer than that. Only a few years ago the existence of extraterrestrials was considered nonsense. Now you work with four different species of them. Greek gods and Atlantis were thought of as nothing but the myths of an ancient culture and yet Diana, daughter of Zeus, and Arthur, the king of Atlantis, are flesh and blood. Hell, even _Batman_ started out as a myth."

"At one point, the populace were certain that the sun revolved around the earth." Batman pointed out. "The Hope Diamond is thought to be cursed, as are the tombs of ancient pharaohs. There are fully grown adults that won't go outside on Friday the 13th. And children all across the world are afraid to go to sleep because they think there is a monster in their closet. I understand where you're coming from Barbara, and your heart is in the right place. Your mindset is good. As a detective you should never give up on a lead until you've exhausted all avenues it leads to. But believe me, I have looked into the Court of Owls more times than I care to remember. And the existence of gods and monsters doesn't lend credence to theirs. Sometimes, myths are just myths. Sometimes the closet is empty."

It took Barbara a moment to process everything she had just heard. Bruce wasn't entirely wrong. Some things were just superstition and folk lore. Even though the Court of Owls was known by any child of Gotham, it wasn't something you would ever bring up in a serious conversation anymore than you would a fairy tale from a children's book. And accusing them of murder would make anyone sound like a complete nutcase. Not to mention the fact that Batman, the prince of paranoia himself, was practically pleading with her to let the idea go.

That said, something in her gut was still bothering her. Sending assassins. Enhancing them with electrum. Going after Batman of all people. If there was no Court of Owls then someone was going one hell of a long way to convince them there was. It seemed far too complex to be a hoax. Not to mention, Bruce had a personal stake in there not being a Court of Owls.

Barbara began hesitantly, knowing that she was treading on thin ice. "Bruce, you're the world's greatest detective. Not only do you have a natural talent for it, but you never let your emotions cloud your judgement. I've always admired you for that. But..."

"But?" He pressed, wondering where she was going.

"...but you're also a very _proud_ man Bruce. It comes with good reason. You've done things that most mortal men couldn't even dream of, and made strides that cause meta-heroes to become envious. But no matter how well earned, that pride might be clouding your vision. Gotham has always been your city, and I'll never say that it's not. Your problem is that you don't want to believe that it's even possible that this city might have belonged to something else. Something that was here before you. When you preach to me that the Court of Owls doesn't exist, who are you trying to convince? Me, or yourself?"

Bruce's throat tightened somewhat under her accusation. He couldn't deny the fact the thought of Gotham in the grip of something criminal turned his stomach. But that didn't change anything. He didn't allow things like that to cloud his judgement. If the evidence had warranted it, he would be the first to declare the Court of Owls was real from the rooftops of Gotham. But the facts were clear. The Court did not, does not, never has, and never will exist. "There's never been any physical evidence to suggest that the Court of Owls is anything other than fiction."

Barbara was quick to counter, though her annoyance was replaced largely with concern at this point. "Until now, you mean."

Batman didn't reply. He only continued forward on the road as they approached the cave.

* * *

When they returned to the cave, Bruce pulled up to the main platform and hopped out. Barbara followed, but paused when she caught sight of a new addition to the cave.

On the wall opposite to the computer, next to the large crevice stood a pair of pods. They reminded Barbara of the stories Dick told her about when they had first found Superboy. Mostly because there were people inside.

There were two seemingly teenage boys in each. Both pods were propped upright against the wall. The pods only came up to their bare pectorals, and cradled the lower half of their bodies. Their arms were to either side of the metal cases, and nearly every inch of their bodies that weren't being concealed from sight by the metal was threaded with an IV line. Some clear liquid was flowing through them into the boys' veins.

There were also a few empty pods and unconnected IV tubed beside them, waiting for someone to be placed inside.

Lifting her eyes away from the machinery, Barbara quickly realized that these were far from normal boys. Their eye catching skin tone and black veins made that abundantly clear.

Batgirl turned around to face the Dark Knight, who was currently standing behind the Batmobile. She rightfully assumed that he would explain himself.

"Those are the assassins that were sent after Lucius. I've hooked them up to a solution meant to lower their core temperatures. It keeps them in stasis."

Batgirl nodded at the explanation. These assassins knew who they were. It was too dangerous to lock them up in a facility like Arkham where anyone could hear them talk. And it appeared that they would have to repeat the process with their newest arrival. Batgirl walked over and stood next to Batman as he opened up the compartment behind the vehicle.

They had placed the frozen assassin in the loading trunk of the Batmobile, which the usually used to store confiscated weapons.

She had thawed out somewhat. The ice had worn away into a thick layer of frost. It appeared to be enough that she was still unable to move.

Barbara only had a moment to mentally prepare herself before Batman reached forward to confiscate her hood. The boys had been disturbing in their own right, so she was expecting the worst.

This one only looked slightly different. The girl that lay underneath that hood was older than the others. Where they were teenagers, she appeared to be in her mid to late twenties. Her skin wasn't deathly pale like theirs either. She was African American. The sickly black veins were still highly visible beneath her dark skin. Her eyes were closed, and she had curly dark locks covering most of her face from the sudden removal of her hood. But just behind her curls, Batgirl could just make out that her lips were blue from the cold. She also had a small beauty mark beneath her left eye.

Without ceremony Batman bent down and gathered the young lady up in his arms, lifting her bridal style before taking her towards the pod. He would conduct a physical examination later to see if it was congruent with what he found from the boys.

As they approached the tanks, Batgirl noticed something about the assassins they already had hooked up that she hadn't been able to tell from the distance. Both boys looked exactly the same. She would have to question Batman about that later.

After the two of them got her into the pod and secured her restraints, Batman worked to get the coolant solution running through her veins as well. Not long after that, the two were greeted by the soft footsteps running down the stairs leading up to the manor. Both bats turned towards the sound to find Jason running down it and practically hitting the platform's railing as he did so. "You're back!"

Jason seemed to be excited about something, because he was already taking off towards the second flight of stairs to get to the lower level. Instead of running towards Bruce or Barbara, he made a beeline for the computer. "Get over here! I had an idea while you were away!"

Looking to each other first, Batman and Batgirl made their way over to the computer where Jason was waiting for them. "What is it?"

Jason turned back to Bruce with a proud and sly grin on his face. "First off, I am by far your smartest protege. No contest after this. You and Dick can eat it." He said, rounding towards Barbara who narrowed her eyes in annoyance.

" _Jason_." Bruce pressed without heat, already feeling the stir of impatience.

Jason's expression morphed quickly and he raised his hands in surrender. "Okay, okay." He before taking a step back so Bruce could sit down in front of the computer, which he did in kind. "So you said you weren't able to get facial recognition on the twins right?"

"Correct." Bruce responded curtly.

"But you also said that when you did your physical exam of them, they were covered in scars. And that must have happened before they had their healing powers, so probably when they were kids."

"Get to the point Jason." Bruce pressed again, patience wearing thin.

Jason's prideful smile returned. "If you're a kid that gets the shit beat out of them all the time, what happens?"

Barbara pondered the thought for a moment. "You run away, or your parents get taken to jail. But they're not kids anymore Jay."

" _But_ either way they would have ended up in the system. CPS or the missing person's database. So if you use your billion dollar computer to make them look a little younger for the camera then..."

Bruce's eyes flashed with surprise for half a second before he went to typing on the computer. "That's brilliant Jason."

"I know." He said he grinned again like a fox.

Though Barbara gave him a side eye and grinned slightly. "It really was. So tell me, which crime show did you steal this idea from?"

Jason turned to Barbara and his grin melted away, replaced with one of shock and betrayal. "How dare you! You honestly think I would do something like that?"

Barbara rolled her eyes. That wasn't even worth a response.

Knowing full well that she would just find out later on her own, Jason snorted indignantly. "Fine damn you. Maybe I came up with it myself. Maybe I saw it on an episode of _Bones_ once."

"Knew it."

"Fuck off."

"Language." Bruce said absently as he continued to work. Regardless of where the idea came from, there was a chance that it would work. He had the security cameras zoom in on and capture the face of their newest arrival. Once that was done, he isolated her face and removed the background. Oddly enough, aging someone down for the purposes of a photo was much easier than the reverse. In this case, he just had to tuck in some of her more defined features and make them less distinct. The nose, brow, cheekbones, and chin. He shortened her hair on the photo as well just in case before running it through his search program. This wouldn't just search CPS or missing persons, but the facial recognition program would essentially scour the entire internet to find a match. Social media platforms, blogs, magazines, and newspapers. If she had any sort of life on the internet, he would find it.

It took a few minutes, but they finally got a match.

Needless to say it had not been what Bruce was expecting.

This was a black and white photograph. In it a young teenage girl was standing in some manner of ring with a torch in her hands, releasing a strong breath unto it so that the flames would rocket outward. It was most certainly the same girl, assuming he had taken in her face correctly. The altered photograph he used and the girl from this photo were identical.

Unable to grasp the concept of the image, Bruce looked up to check the context of the image. It appeared to come from a news article. The Gotham Gazette in fact.

_~Come One, Come All! Watch the Stunning Displays of Cecilia Wright, The Dragon's Daughter!~_

Cecilia Wright.

At least now they had a name.

Though the way that header was worded sounded familiar. As Bruce looked down at the photo itself again, he realized what the ring she was standing in was. It was the _center_ ring.

A circus.

She was from a circus.

For just a moment Bruce's mind left him and was drawn back eight years in the past. His date seemed excited at the prospect of doing something unusual rather than attending a fancy restaurant. Nearly the second after she said that, they passed by Amusement Mile. The tent was just starting to get set up, and they would be ready for a show later that night. Bruce and his date had gone right over and bought tickets for that afternoon, expecting a nice night out. Instead, Bruce saw another young boy become an orphan.

"Bruce." Barbara said, snapping him out of his trance. "This can't be her. Look at the date."

Bruce shook his head to clear his thoughts before doing so. He could see right away why Barbara was so adamant.

_July 19, 1931_

It sent his mind reeling. This had to be a mistake. It had to be the same girl. Their faces were identical right down to the mole beneath her eye. And her performance abilities with fire certainly explained how she was able to set the entire police station ablaze so quickly. There were too many similarities for it to be a coincidence.

Curiosity soon got the best of him, and Batman quickly got to work altering the photo from one of the boys as well. The plus side of them being identical was that he only had to do one photo for both of them. It took another few minutes to do that and then run it through his system, but he soon got another hit.

It made no more sense than the first result.

Bruce's breath caught as he looked over the new document. This one wasn't a photograph, but a caricature. It showed two boys, identical to both each other and to the photo he had created, tossing knives and torches back and forth between each other. Again, Bruce looked at the header for conformation.

_~For the First Time Anywhere, Witness the Amazing Gemini Jugglers!~_

_Dated March 3, 1876_

No names immediately listed for either. He would have to look deeper for that. But still, the sight of the two boys from the portrait smiling brighter than the sun was off putting. It was a far cry from the image in his mind's eye. That of two young men turned into monsters.

"Bruce." Barbara whispered again. She sounded like the breath had been forcefully pulled from her lungs. He didn't have to turn to know her blue eyes were wide with shock and a hint of terror. "Look."

He looked up just enough to follow where her finger was pointing. It wasn't up at the header of the photo which listed them as jugglers, but rather down towards the bottom.

Bruce choked, sucked in a breath, and chocked again. He had to imagine this was similar to what Barbara had felt when she first noticed it. Similar to whatever style of horror Jason was experiencing now. He couldn't be bothered to even look at his son as he quickly moved past the shock and got to work again, pulling up the file for Cecilia as well.

Fear, something that he had worked for years to oust from himself, suddenly penetrated his chest and spread through his body like a virus.

Each poster had the same words written across the bottom of the page in bolded letters.

_~Brought To You By Haly's Circus~_

He wanted to believe in the worst possible way that this was still a hoax. That these kids were simply remarkably similar in appearance to those he had captured. That Haly's had nothing to do with this. That this was all a coincidence.

But even Batgirl seemed to accept now that it was them, regardless of what the dates said.

Suddenly, Jason voiced what had been pressing on all of their minds. "Haly's Circus? Isn't that where Dick's from?"

Neither had the strength to answer. Suddenly the fact that they were able to mimic Nightwing's acrobatics made perfect sense. Someone had seen in them the same thing Batman had seen in Dick. They both saw children in the circus. They both were able to look beyond that and see what they might become. They both saw a well of untapped potential, and a will to use it.

But that was where the similarities between Bruce and this third party ended.

For Bruce had constructed a hero.

And this unknown faction created monsters.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (1) In case you were wondering why I always make the point of saying their voices sound distorted, it's because of the comics. Whenever a Talon speaks in the comics, their text bubble is inverted so the text is white and the background is black. I always assumed that meant their voices were somehow inhuman sounding.


	4. Bloodlines

_The Next Night_

Jack Haly never liked Gotham.

Even in the days before what happened to the Graysons he never enjoyed their trips here.

He only ever entered the city when the Court told him to. Otherwise, he would never want to see the city again.

Gotham was ugly. It was deformed like some terrible disease had taken hold of it. The city had far more despair than it did hope. Even Batman, their so called protector, didn't give hope to the innocent. He only spread fear to the criminals. As far as Haly was concerned, he was no better than the scum he took down.

This city...

It took everything from everyone. Ripped families and friendships apart for the hell of it. Not only was the city diseased. It was as though every person that stepped within her limits became victims of its' plague as well.

It had taken the Graysons, perhaps the kindest and most compassionate people to ever walk the earth, and it destroyed them. It killed four of them, paralyzed another, and orphaned the last.

Gotham would never be beautiful. It took beauty and corrupted it.

No one exemplified that better than the Talons.

They were taken to the Court as innocent and loving children. They came out as disgusting and undying monsters.

"Hey Haly!" Jack looked up at his name being called. He got up from the fence he had been laying against during his daydream and his eyes landed on the strongman who doubled as a security guard. "We're nearly done unloading the train. Why don't you head in? You seem tired."

Haly smiled gratefully at his employee's concern. "I will. Thanks Marty." He was right. A few hours wouldn't hurt. He didn't like to be outside in Gotham anyway.

He took a walk back to the train, but his mind was still plagued by thoughts of the Talons. Sometimes he wondered what they were doing, but quickly shook off such thoughts as he was certain he did not want to know the answer. Other times he wondered if they could remember anything before the Court. If they only knew that before their lives was consumed by blood and death, it contained colors and calliope music and animals.

If only they knew that before they killed, they flew.

These thoughts were cut short when he entered his private living quarters only to find a black figure already there. His first thoughts flew to a Talon. There was always one waiting for him whenever he came to Gotham. But he quickly realized that wasn't the case. No Talon stood that tall or had that much bulk. Acrobats were compact by nature. Once the panic in his gut settled, he finally saw the cape and cowl.

Haly released a breath. Not quite the person he wanted to see, but certainly better than the alternative. "What are you doing here?"

Batman's eyes narrowed. Not quite his infamous glare, but unpleasant to be on the receiving end of regardless. "I could ask you the same question."

Haly looked at him unimpressed and walked further into the room, avoiding the uninvited guest like a leaper. "This is _my_ room and _my_ circus."

"I meant in Gotham." Batman clarified, his eyes following Haly as the man walked past him. "After what happened to the Flying Graysons, you swore you would never come back here."

He had sworn that. He thought he had meant it. Surely the Court would never risk another prized aerialist by having him enter the city again. Surely they would come to him instead. But the Court was made up of rich people that were used to getting what they wanted when they wanted. And Haly hadn't been in a position to refuse them when they called him back over. "Things change I guess. I hope you didn't come here because you wanted a thank you for Zucco."

It wasn't as though he wasn't grateful, but he always felt as thought Batman and the law could have done more. Four murders and he would be getting paroled later this year. Now that was justice.

"I didn't. I came here because some weeks ago, an assassin broke into Wayne Manor and attempted to kill the residents."

Haly whipped around to face Batman with wide eyes and face suspended in terror. "Oh God! Is Dick-"

"Richard Grayson is fine." Batman interrupted with his voice like iron. "He wasn't residing in the manor at the time. Wayne and his son survived the attack as well."

Haly let out a breath and sat down on his bed. He knew that some people would never understand, but he truly loved that boy like he was his own. The idea of the last Flying Grayson dying made Haly sick to his stomach.

"That's not all. There were several other attacks. Most of the murderers got away and their targets were killed. Three though, were apprehended." Batman said as he took out what looked like a pair of fliers from beneath his cape. "Cecilia Wright. Adam Duran. Michael Duran. Or as you may otherwise know them, The Dragon's Daughter and the Gemini Jugglers."

If he was being honest with himself, Haly froze before Batman uttered their pseudonyms. He knew their names by heart. He had lost count of the number of times he had read over the Book of Names and saw them there. He had every name from the first Talon to the last memorized. It felt almost like an obligation. The world would never know what happened to those kids. Someone had to.

And yet, he still had to feign ignorance. He didn't dare do anything that might point to the Court of Owls existing. They would kill him and his sons in a heartbeat. To keep up the act, Haly grabbed the fliers out of Batman's hand and looked down at them, trying to act as though it were for the first time. It was hard, and he had to stuff down the urge to wince. He always forgot just how young the recruits always were.

Haly had to clear his throat before speaking. "I...heard stories about them. They were some of my father's and grandfather's greatest hits. But...it couldn't be them. They're all-"

"Dead?" Batman interrupted, not buying Haly's act for a moment. "Yes I know. At first the principle itself was perplexing enough. They were born in 1865 and 1915. The twins should be long dead, and if Cecilia were alive she'd have to be in her nineties. So I did some more digging. As it turns out, she shouldn't be alive under any circumstances. She died on her sixteenth birthday. She was practicing an act that she had done a thousand times over but tragically something caused her to slip up, leading her to burn to death. At least that's what the police report says. The twins died young as well. They supposedly went swimming in the river and the current pulled them under. They're bodies were never found, and Cecilia's was too burned for any form of identification. It's a terribly odd coincidence, because all three of them are alive and well and attempted to murder Gotham political officials within the last month. So I continued to dig. You have quite the unlucky streak, don't you Mr. Haly? Fourty-six children have died in this circus over the years. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. You get regular donations from an anonymous source every few months or so. Without those donations, you would have had to close down years ago. So I looked at similar carnivals and circuses that have had unfortunate deaths involving children that have also received large sums of money from an anonymous source. There are several dozen other acts with similar histories. The death count adds up to over two hundred. Almost always children. Bodies that were never found or couldn't be identified. And yet, those very same children have been turning up some centuries later and killing the officials of Gotham. But none of that is what's truly hard to grasp. What even I can't fathom is how the people in charge of these children could allow it to go on for so long. Certainly, someone on the inside had to have known what was happening to them. Someone could have stopped it."

Once Haly was frozen in place under the weight of the long accusation and Batman was satisfied, the Dark Knight walked closer to where Haly sat and knelt down so they were at eye level. Then he fixed him with a Batglare and spoke in a strong, unmovable tone of voice. "I'm going to ask you this, and I'm going to ask once. What do you know about the Court of Owls?"

Even though Haly felt otherwise paralyzed, he was still able to stutter a response to that as though he had trained himself for this day. "I-it-it d-doesn't exist!"

Batman narrowed his eyes further as he got back on his feet. "Most people would ask what the Court of Owls was. After all, it's only known to natives of Gotham. To say it doesn't exist sounds much more like a response you were told to give."

When Haly started to breath laboriously, Batman knew he had the circus owner right where he wanted him. "You have the chance to do the right thing here Haly. A chance for some semblance of making amends with what you've done."

"You don't understand!" Haly said as he got up and grabbed the Batman by the front of his uniform. Most people were not insane enough to try such a thing. That could only mean there was something that scared Haly far more than the wrath of Batman.

The older of the two men looked around the room quickly as though he had to reassure himself that no one else was there to listen before speaking again. "These people! They will _kill_ me! They'll kill everyone I love! I can't do this! Please don't make me!"

Batman grabbed his wrists tightly and removed them from the front of his uniform, pushing the older back onto the bed more forcefully than necessary. "So you're willing to sacrifice Richard to save yourself?"

"What?! Dick's not-"

"How can you be sure?" The Dark Knight interrupted. "It seems that you're not a part of these people's inner workings. You have no say in what they do or how they do it. How can you know for certain that they won't go after Richard next. He's still sixteen. They've taken people older than him before. What's to stop them now?"

Even though the words were meant to break Haly, Bruce couldn't deny that they resonated with himself as well. When he had uncovered all the disappearances and deaths involving the circus, it occurred to him that the same fate very well could have befallen Dick. He still wasn't sure what criteria they used to choose which children to take in, but the possibility was there regardless. Never before had Bruce been so glad that he took Dick in than when he realized that.

Haly seemed to have entered a near catatonic state. He couldn't think. He couldn't speak. He barely felt like he could breath. It was a lose-lose situation. If he told Batman what he wanted to know, the Court would 'send a Talon for his head' as it were. If he didn't, Batman would more than likely send him to prison. Either way, his fate was grim.

But some greater force seemed to have decided he hadn't suffered enough. Batman's next words completely knocked the wind out of him. "The assassin who attacked Wayne was five feet eleven inches. About one hundred and eighty pounds. He supposedly made the remark 'how I love killing Waynes' at the time."

Haly nearly screamed in terror. He knew that assassin well. The one who had taken particular interest in Dick. He was the only one the Court would ever send to kill a Wayne.

Batman turned towards the door when he next spoke and made for it without ceremony. "I see by your expression that you know him. Turn over what information you have to the authorities and you'll get full immunity. Reject this offer and I'll have no mercy on you."

He left the room with the door slamming shut behind him.

It took some time to fully process, but eventually it hit him like a train.

Everything he had done. Everything he had continued to do. It all came crashing down on him at once like the roof had given in.

Jack Haly broke down, fell unto his knees, and cried tears of shame and guilt.

* * *

"Did he piss himself? I bet he pissed himself."

" _Jason_." Bruce warned as he pulled the cowl off and made his way through the cave. He was getting ready to go upstairs, and was already making preparations to peel off the rest of his uniform. He didn't need the distraction.

Though a second or two later, Bruce could have sworn he heard Barbara whisper something along the lines of _'he definitely did'_ and Jason's subsequent laughter. Bruce rolled his eyes at their antics.

"So we're really calling it?" Barbara asked after he had his uniform off and was standing in front of them in his workout attire. "The Court of Owls is real?"

Bruce nodded begrudgingly. "It would appear that way. Some of these disappearances go back as far as four hundred years. The possibility of a hoax is no longer viable."

"Is no one going to talk about that though?" Jason asked, the same ball full of energy he always was. "I mean, these guys are over a hundred years old. How come they still look like they would need a fake ID to drink?"

"You have the electrum to thank for that." Bruce said as he gestured for his proteges to follow him upstairs, which the did in kind. "It would appear its' capabilities far surpass what I originally believed. It also brings the aging process to a grinding halt."

"That's tempting." Jason said before humming. "Actually, no it's not. Did you see those ugly bastards? Their veins and shit? I'm okay with growing up as long as I get to stay pretty."

Batgirl must have smacked Jason upside the head while they followed Bruce up the stairs, because he heard the smack of flesh against flesh and subsequent curses from Jason. "This isn't something to joke about Jason. This is way past taking down a handful of the Riddler's thugs and calling it a night. We're talking about something bigger than Gotham has ever seen before." She chided rather harshly before letting out an angry sigh and taking out her phone. "I'll call Nightwing."

"No, you won't."

Both sidekicks stopped their ascension up the staircase and looked up at their mentor, who still had their back turned to them and was walking up to the manor as though nothing had happened.

"Bruce, he has a right to know-"

"That a killer once worked at Haly's Circus? It could be coincidence." He said impassively as he continued walking and disappeared through the entrance.

Barbara glared before chasing after Bruce, Jason not far behind her. She found Bruce in the foyer just as he was sitting down on the sofa in front of the fireplace. " _Three_ killers that we know of. Possibly as many as two hundred killers in total. All the same approximate age he was when he was a Flying Grayson at the time they disappeared. And you don't believe in coincidences."

"Am I also obligated to inform you every time I have a suspect that attended the same high school as you?" He asked, not bothering to take his eyes off the fire as he did so.

Barbara felt like tearing her hair out. She understood why this was happening perfectly. Bruce was still at odds with Dick over the adoption. Because this was so sensitive to Dick, telling him about this outright would probably lead to an even bigger fight with Bruce. But that didn't make it alright goddammit! If he didn't tell Dick about this right away, it would only make things that much worse when the former Boy Wonder did find out. "That's a terrible comparison and you know it. That circus wasn't a school. It was his home for eight years. The people there were his family. They still are."

"I'll decide if and when Nightwing needs to be informed. That's final." Bruce was no speaking in his no nonsense voice. That was when Barbara knew she was beat. Bruce was incredibly stubborn, and they didn't have Alfred here to win the argument for them. There was no way to circumvent him when he had made up his mind like this.

Sensing the growing tension in the room, Jason ran over to the couch and plopped down next to his adoptive father before changing the subject. "Why would someone want to train circus kids to be killers anyway? You'd think they'd go for soldiers or something."

"A military officer's sudden disappearance or death would raise a much larger red flag than that of a child performer. And military personnel are all a minimum of eighteen years old. Taking someone as a child or young teen ensures that they could be programmed and controlled. I found scars on all three of them. At first I thought it was a sign of child abuse, but now I realize it must have come from _training_." Bruce spat out the last word like poison.

"That's... _horrible_." Barbara said with a hand over her chest as though she was checking her heart. She too took a seat by the fireplace so that she was sitting across from Bruce.

"Indeed." Even if he was saying it with his stoic tone, it was clear that the thought of it shook and disgusted him as well. Child soldiers. God forgive them.

Jason chose to change the subject again, though he too was internally furious with the thought of what must have happened to those kids after the Court took them. "But why a circus, of all places to steal kids from?"

"What type of performers were the assassins we have in custody?" Bruce asked, his eyes never leaving the fire as it licked the wooden logs.

Barbara only needed a moment to think before answering. "Two jugglers and a fire-breather."

"Take those skills and apply them to rigorous training and the drive to kill. What do they become?"

This time Barbara needed a bit longer to think it over. When it came to her, she lowered her eyes and rubbed her temple as it clicked together in his mind. "Incredible hand eye coordination and pyrotechnics expertise."

"Precisely. That hand eye coordination is exactly how the twins, Adam and Michael, were able to handle my batarangs without detonating them, and how Cecilia was so skillful in setting fire to the station." Bruce said. To some extent it felt almost hypocritical to analyze it so indifferently. After all, he was attempting to pass judgement on Haly and the Court for taking advantage of children who had remarkable potential, but isn't that exactly what he had done with Dick?

Alfred had strenuously objected to the inception of Robin. When he first brought Dick along with him to meet up with Gordon at the signal and Gordon saw Dick, Bruce could tell it was all the Commissioner could not to shoot Batman on sight for bringing a child into their war on crime.

Jason was different. He had already grown up terribly, and he was bound for a life of violence no matter what Bruce did. With him, it became much less of a choice and more of an obligation.

Bruce always preferred to remind himself that Robin had been Dick's idea and he had all but demanded it. But was that really an excuse? Saying no was a large part of being a parent. Bruce just wanted to see Dick get justice, when really he should have been allowed to have a childhood.

Bruce pulled his eyes away from the fire, no longer able to think about Dick and wanting to distract himself. When he looked to his protege that was currently seated next to him, he found the boy carrying a contemplative expression. "Is there anything else?"

Jason looked up to Bruce with unsure eyes, like he wasn't sure it was a good idea to tell Bruce what had been on his mind. Eventually though he remembered that it was usually fruitless to keep secrets from Bruce. "There is. You told me that the last Wayne that didn't die of natural causes died over fifty years ago. So there was no possible way the guy who broke in could have killed a Wayne before. But if these assassins come from all different time periods, going back centuries...well..."

Jason was starting to get nervous. Bruce's family had always been the most delicate of topics, and he was basically insinuating that many of his blood relatives may have been assassinated by the Court of Owls.

Bruce didn't seem to mind the implication though. "Don't hesitate. You could be right." The thought had occurred to him. The murder of his parents had shocked Gotham thoroughly. But realistically, it shouldn't have. Many Waynes over the centuries died prematurely. Bruce's grandparents, his great uncles and aunts, several members of his extended family, and a handful of cousins had died suspicious deaths. He had known this for some time, but only the death of his parents truly stayed with him. Until now that is.

"Well, any Waynes in particular that are worthy of note?" Barbara interjected.

"Perhaps..." Bruce said thoughtfully. As he had gone over before, many Waynes had more than likely been killed by the Court. But in his many years of investigating he Court, one name in particular came up more than any other. "My great great grandfather. Alan Wayne. He was an architect responsible for the construction of many buildings that still exist within Gotham today."

"How'd he die?" Jason asked tactlessly.

"He supposedly fell into a manhole and drowned. Foul play wasn't suspected on account of the fact that his behavior had become erratic." Bruce explained before finally revealing the detail that was most critical to his ancestor's death. "He...he became convinced that owls were trying to kill him."

Jason and Barbara looked to each other. "Owls?"

"He had dementia. Most likely Alzheimer's. He boarded up his doors and windows because he was convinced the owls wanted to kill him. But that delusion was eventually overcome by another one. Eventually he took to running barefoot through the streets because he thought the owls were already inside the house. His mind had left him by then."

Jason hummed and laid back on the couch, not completely convinced by that explanation. "Maybe. Or maybe the rest of the city was crazy, and he was the only sane one in it."

No one had the heart to respond to that.

* * *

_Two Nights Later_

The Batsignal had been surprisingly easy to repair.

Even the most corrupt city officials considered it an essential service to the public, and had it fixed within twenty four hours. Gordon found it hard to believe it had been less than a week since he was nearly killed on this very same roof, or that the signal in question had been completely destroyed by a firebomb.

Everything was back to being in its' natural order.

Speaking of which...

"What's the problem, Jim?"

Gordon grinned a little. He stopped being surprised by the fact that he always heard Batman's voice before even being aware of his presence. He even swore at one point that he would never allow the Dark Knight to sneak up on him like that again, only to realize that it was never a matter of _letting_ him.

Gordon fully turned to the Caped Crusader, who had positioned himself behind the lit signal. Most likely something thematic about a bat keeping to the darkness. "You're a sight for sore eyes, as usual."

"Does this involve the assassin who went after you?"

Jim shrugged. Straight to business then. But the honest answer was that he didn't know if this had anything to do with the woman who came after him. But it most definitely related to the Bat. "Were you expecting a tip of some sort?"

Batman shifted a bit and his expression lightened the smallest bit.

"I'll take that as a yes." Gordon said before extending what looked like a yellow envelope in a plastic evidence bag to Batman. On the front was an illustration of a large bat. That certainly sent a clear message of who it was intended for. "We already checked for explosives and anthrax, in case you were wondering."

Batman nodded before he took the sealed envelope into his hands. "Where did this come from?" He asked as he looked down at the bat on the front.

"Anonymous source. It was dropped off by a street kid that said some guy in a hood approached him and offered him a hundred bucks to bring it to the police station. No prints, and the kid couldn't give a description. Now since this hasn't been properly cataloged yet, it would be a serious breach of ethics to release it to a third party of any sort. So I can't even show that to anybody."

Batman nodded again as he looked up to Jim. "And what exactly is this envelope that you're not showing me?"

Again, Gordon shrugged. "Turn it over."

Batman complied. There was no illustration on the back as there was with the front. Only four letters scrawled across in thick black ink.

_F.H.E.O._

"For his eyes only?" Batman guessed.

Gordon nodded. "You've done more for this city than any of us can thank you for. I think that means you deserve to have a trade secret or two. No one's looked inside except to confirm that it's nothing dangerous."

Batman looked down at the envelope again, turning it back over. "Thank you, Jim."

"This involve the kid?"

Batman tensed the slightest bit, and Gordon had his answer. It seemed Batman often times forgot that he himself was also a detective. And he the look on Batman's face the moment he arrived. It was a father's concern.

It was a popular rumor around the department and most likely all of Gotham. That Robin was Batman's son. Everyone also knew that Nightwing was in fact the first Robin, and the second one was most likely a younger sibling. Gordon may have disagreed with the premise of bringing a child into the battlefield that was Gotham City, but he could not deny the fact that just like Gotham needed Batman, and Batman needed Robin. "The older, or the new one?"

"Older." He said curtly. It occurred to Gordon somewhere in the back of his mind that this conversation was the closest thing the two of them ever got to socializing. It got a tad more personal when Batman asked him a question back. "You have a daughter, correct?"

Batman of course knew the answer, but that wasn't something Jim needed to know. As far as the world was concerned, Batman had never even heard the name Barbara Gordon.

"That's right. Barbara." It spoke to the unnamed trust the two shared that Jim was willing to offer his daughter's name to the vigilante.

Batman looked up again and even with the white lenses obscuring the eyes underneath, there was a certain resonance between them as though they were making eye contact when Batman spoke next. "Hold her close."

Jim's expression softened as he nodded. "I will."

With everything that needed to be said aired, Batman took his grapple gun and went out into the night taking the file with him.

The two fathers parted company, the safety of children being their only concern.

* * *

"You think Haly sent it?" Jason asked as he attempted to climb up a stool behind his mentor so as to look over his shoulder and watch the tests he was performing.

Bruce's narrowed eyes didn't look up from the microscope he was leaning over. "He would seem to be the most likely candidate."

Despite Gordon's assurance that they had checked the envelope for anything dangerous, Bruce's paranoia didn't allow him to open the file without conducting every test in his arsenal three times over. He had subjected it to X-rays, metal detectors, and even subjected it to radiation to kill off any organic agents. So far it seemed clean. This was his last test. Checking the ink underneath to see if there was anything there. It seemed a tad over the top even to his standards, but a touch poison in the form of ink wouldn't be the strangest thing he ever encountered.

When his test was finally concluded, he removed the envelope from under the microscope and walked over to the computer with it. "It's clean." He called to Barbara.

She practically leapt up from her seat. Clearly his proteges were anxious to see what was hidden within the envelope after spending so many hours waiting for his tests to conclude. Bruce would be lying if her said he himself hadn't been a bit anxious. But this was no time to be impatient.

Once he was seated at his computer terminal, Bruce opened the envelope with a small bit of hesitation and reached inside. He felt was must have been a file and pulled it out. When he did he saw a small piece of paper slip out from the bottom of the file and fall right back into the envelope. Handing the file of to Barbara for the time being, Bruce reached inside and dug around for the slip until he found it and pulled it back out. There were small words scribbled across the slip in an almost panicked fashion. Bruce had to squint to make out what it said.

When he did, ice rushed through his veins.

 _There's nothing I can do to convince you of this, and I don't blame you if you think I'm lying, but I am sorry. Not a single day has passed where I don't think about those kids. About what the Court did to them. About what_ I _did to them. I'm not gonna pretend to be a saint in this. I knew what I was doing. But I won't ever apologize for protecting my family. The Court would have killed them. I don't know how Wayne pulled it off, but Talons never leave people alive. Never. They would have come after my sons. I did what I did to protect them. That doesn't mean I liked it._

_But Dick...he's different. You need to leave him out of this. I'm begging you. He doesn't know anything about the Court I swear. He's a good kid. You need to protect him. If he ever found out the truth it would destroy him. Wayne and Zucco never could have imagined just how important the Graysons were to the Court. If they had they never would have gone within a hundred miles of the circus. That doesn't matter now. What's done is done. Dick's got a good life now. Please don't take that from him._

_You need to keep him safe._

Bruce let the paper slip from his grasp and pinched the bridge of his nose. He had been hoping beyond hope that this wouldn't happen. That the Court's connection to Haly did not necessarily mean they had a connection to Dick. But that clearly wasn't the case.

Quite the opposite in fact. Haly felt the need to mention Dick by name. That could only mean that their connection ran deeper than even Batman dare think.

Not only Dick himself though. The Graysons as a whole. What could that possibly be though. Could they have been agents of the Court like Haly had been? Were they members of the Court themselves? Or, the very worst possibility, could they have been chosen to be Talons like the others?

No longer willing to dwell on the possibilities, he turned to Barbara and Jason, both of which were already taking apart papers from the file. "What is it?"

"These look like progress reports on a particular assassin-"

"Talon." Bruce corrected.

Batgirl snorted at the interruption and gave Bruce a light glare before continuing. "Progress reports on a particular _Talon_ , most likely done while he was still in training." Barbara looked up from the paper she was looking at to make eye contact with Bruce. "Does the name William Cobb jump out at you?"

Bruce considered it for half a heartbeat. "I can't say that it does."

"Well he's the only Talon that these files talk about. I wonder how Haly got his hands on this." She drifted off as she looked over a few more documents. She handed a few more to Bruce, knowing that her boss would want to see them himself.

Bruce looked over them with a fine tooth comb. These papers read like the reports of a physician. It recorded this William Cobb's height and weight class along with muscle development, healing injuries, and the works. By the looks of it, William Cobb was the Talon the Court of Owls sent to kill him. He was certainly the right body type.

Bruce turned over another page and found a photograph on it. It must have been William. He looked similar to the other Talons, sharing their more unusual qualities. His hair was wavy and untamed, and a light coppery brown. He was looking at the camera with the same blank eyes and expression that Bruce had observed in the twins. The color of his eyes was the same eerie yellow as well. Beyond that he was also deathly pale and had dark veins. Unnatural by usual standards, but perfectly ordinary for a Talon. The only thing that really set him apart from the others was his age.

He seemed to be late twenties. Maybe early thirties. It didn't mean much either way. That was just his physical appearance. In reality he was likely far older than even Alfred. Turning over another page, he found that assumption to be true.

_Subject's name: William Cobb_

_Born: October 10, 1901_

_Occupation: Knife Thrower_

This seemed to be a few stray notes of when William was first taken to the Court. He had been eighteen at the time he was taken. It went on to explain that his mother had been widowed when Cobb was young and he went to taking up juggling baseballs in the streets for spare change. One day by a complete chance encounter, Cobb met Jack Haly's father who proceeded to offer him a job. Once he became a part of the circus, he traded in his baseballs for knives and became a local celebrity. It went on further after that but Bruce was already somewhere else. He couldn't keep his eyes off of William's picture. He looked incredibly familiar.

Bruce was pulled from his reading when Jason spoke up.

"What year did you say Alan Wayne died?"

Bruce hummed as he recollected it. "1922."

"This guy...Cobb. He would have been twenty one by then. His file says that he had been Talon for three years by then." Jason looked up from what he was reading to look at Bruce with concern marring his expression. "He did say he loved killing Waynes."

Bruce appreciated the concern. He knew Jason meant well. The subject of his family was a delicate one. But the fact was that Alan was his great great grandfather. He had never even met the man. When he spoke, it may have come out a bit harsher than Bruce intended. "If you're afraid that I'm going to act irrationally because of a murder of someone I never met which William Cobb may have committed nearly a hundred years ago-"

Bruce was cut off by a punctuated gasp. Both males turned to see Barbara, holding a hand up to cover her mouth and shaking like a leaf, her eyes never leaving the document she was holding. She looked like she had just been told someone she loved died. Even more so when Bruce saw a tear escape her eye and roll down her cheek. "Barbara? What's wrong?"

She didn't answer. Bruce doubted she even heard him. Soon enough Jason was at her side. Bruce waited patiently for Jason to read through and tell him what the issue was. Instead Jason skimmed the file and his eyes lit up in terror. That didn't bode well. Jason wasn't scared of anything.

When Bruce accepted the fact that neither of his proteges would share the information with him, he reached forward and grabbed the wad of papers from Barbara.

By the time he was done reading, Bruce wished to any force on heaven or earth that he could go back in time and stop himself from ever looking into the Court.

* * *

_Our brother and sister Owls hold very high hopes for our newest arrival. It is an investment that even I find myself giddy with. How can we not be overjoyed? This one comes from the house of Cobb._

_William's skills with knives make him a perfect candidate._

_He will make an excellent Talon, just as his grandfather did._

* * *

Bruce narrowed his eyes in disgust as he read. Clearly the file he read previously which claimed that Cobb had been orphaned was written in half truths. His father died, but he would have had a grandfather to take care of him if not for them. He was one of many to be taken by the Court. Only...

Bruce turned back to the paper he had taken from Barbara. The writer called it the house of Cobb. That implied that the Court of Owls had taken a special interest in this family. But why?

The next entry was dated a little over a year later.

* * *

_He has done it. William Cobb has done it._

_In this Court, there is only one way to prove yourself the superior warrior. One must kill their predecessor. And now, William Cobb has been baptized with the blood of his grandfather, and risen to become our new Talon._

* * *

Again, Batman stifled the urge to look away from the records. It was revolting. Forcing a someone to kill his own family. More likely than not this wasn't meant as a test of strength at all. If these Cobbs were as skilled as these papers claimed, the Court more likely didn't want there to be more than one for fear that they would overthrow the Court.

Again, an entry was dated several months later.

* * *

_He is no longer simply good. He is our best. No other Talon in the history of the Court has been as skilled as William Cobb. He is most certainly our greatest Talon._

_Now it is time to set him with another test. The Cobbs have a very proud tradition with this Court. An assignment we could only impose on one from the bloodline._

_He will eliminate one of our enemies from the house of Wayne._

_By his claws, Alan Wayne will die._

* * *

Bruce gripped the file tighter and he was suddenly very glad he hadn't found it in him to confront Jason earlier. He had been wrong. This was getting to him. It was far worse than Bruce could have imagined. They were no longer talking about one relative that he never met. If these files were to be believed, the Cobbs were responsible for the murders of several members of the Wayne family going back generations.

Bruce was angry when he read on about how Cobb killed Alan Wayne, the act written in great detail.

He was furious when he went on to read that Cobb killed a dozen members of the Wayne family in total.

But his soul was completely shattered when he read what came next.

* * *

_Wayne's death was a work of beauty. Cobb is our greatest warrior by far. None can surpass him. We doubt any ever will._

_However..._

_With this fact comes concern. Cobb will eventually grow old. He will wither as all Talons have. We will of course give him electrum, but then there remains the question of what to do regarding William's successor. What should come at that time? What Talon could ever hope to follow in his great footsteps? Who will look after the Court when he is gone?_

_We have relayed this concern to William. He reciprocated with a wonderful offer._

_William's dalliance with the Crowne girl produced something of worth. An heir._

_We always knew that the line of Cobb will produce the Talon who shall bring Gotham City to its' knees._

_And it all begins with William's son._

_We will change the surname so the fool Crowne never suspects a thing. And what better name to choose than the one which is written into the child's very destiny._

_He is the perfect one to uphold the legacy. A child of black and white. William's Gray Son._

* * *

_What?_

Bruce reread the paragraph at least ten times over, hoping ~~praying~~ that he had been hallucinating.

This couldn't be right. Gray Son?

Bruce scrambled through some other papers until he finally found Cobb's picture again. He couldn't deny that their was a clear resemblance. Haly's letter indicated a clear infatuation with the Graysons. In fact, the fixation the Court for the Graysons seemed to be exactly like the one they carried for the Cobbs. Could that be...

...because the two families were one in the same?

No.

No it couldn't be.

It must have been a coincidence.

Bruce turned the page.

It wasn't a coincidence.

* * *

_William Cobb's heir was sent to Haly's Circus under the name James Grayson twenty years ago._

_He is a talented acrobat in his own right, but he is not the one we have been searching for. Since that has been made abundantly clear, there is only one thing the boy is good for anymore. Continuing the line._

_Now that William's son has reached maturity, we arranged a chance encounter between him and a young aerialist. She is far better than him. An excellent specimen to breed with._

_Just as we had hoped, their encounter bloomed into romance. Now we must wait once more._

* * *

_The line of Grayson continues to spread. He has given us two more boys; Richard and John._

* * *

No

* * *

_They are stunning to watch, but perhaps too old for us now. We have already made the appropriate arrangements for the brothers to mate. Chance encounters once more._

_John has already begun flirtations with the female we selected. A young miss Mary Lloyd._

* * *

Nonononononononono

* * *

_This is the one. We have finally found him. After all these years, the Gray Son of Gotham is here at last._

_The brothers have had two children between them. Rick's young son John is a talented young man and is worth looking into_ _for being a Talon himself. But for the Gray Son...our eyes are set on another prize._

* * *

No

No

_No_

* * *

_Richard John Grayson is the most daring acrobat of them all..._

* * *

_No!_

* * *

_He will carry on Cobb's legacy..._

* * *

**_No!_ **

* * *

_He is our Gray Son._

_He shall remake Gotham in our image._

_And he will start by destroying the_ _**Batman** _ _._

* * *

**_NO!_ **

Bruce threw the papers aside before anyone could blink and threw himself toward the computer. His eyes were wide. His heart was pounding. He was certain that his proteges were looking at him with mortification still marring their faces.

He was pulling up the DNA profile he had previously collected from the assassin when he bled in the manor. He had all his proteges genetics on file as well. Now he just had to run it.

Bruce's chest heaved as his breathing became rapid. He yanked at the collar of his uniform while he worked and sucked in oxygen like it was draining from the room. His heart hammered so fiercely within his chest that it caused a dull ache against his ribs. He could barely continue to type because his hands were shaking. Had he been anyone else, tears of desperation would more than likely be spilling from his eyes as well.

This couldn't be right. This was a mistake. Whoever had written these reports had been _lying_.

This couldn't be real.

This was _wrong_.

Dick was not one of them! He and William Cobb couldn't be further apart. They were barely a part of the same species.

He had accepted that Dick and the rest of the Graysons were connected to the Court in some fashion after reading Haly's letter. But not like this. Never like this!

Bruce's thoughts swirled into a storm of unbridled panic. He began to drown them out to focus on what he was doing. When he was finally finished, he looked up to the screen and waited another moment for the results to appear.

Once they did, the clatter of the files falling to the ground echoed in the dead silence of the cave.

Bruce clung to his seat as fear gripped his heart and water came to his eyes. Not once in his adult life had been overcome with this feeling. Not even Scarecrow's toxin had ever come close to horrifying him to such a degree. Suddenly it all faded into black. The cave. Barbara. Jason. His mantle. It all was swept away.

He wasn't Batman anymore. He was a small scared eight year old whose parents were just gunned down in front of him. But if Bruce was being completely honest with himself, not even that touched on the dread he felt in this moment.

If he had even the smallest amount of energy left in his body, Bruce would smash the computer screen to bits and scream in outrage that what it was telling him couldn't be true. It was all lies. All of it.

It wasn't true.

It wasn't.

It _wasn't_.

_William Cobb_

_99.97% Ancestral Match_

_Richard John Grayson_

Bruce bowed his head, no longer able to will himself to continue looking at the screen, and no longer able to deny what it was telling him. He brought his hand up to cover his face, wondering how this could have happened.

Alan Wayne had been right all along.

The owls were already inside his home.

And he had _raised_ one of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so I'm still working on the next chapter and I still have school, so it might take longer to get up. In the meantime, I really hope you liked this.
> 
> PLEASE review and tell me what you thought. Thanks!


	5. Owls to Athens

_One Week Later_

Bruce Wayne had always been a welcomed face to see in public, no matter the pretense. His charm and demeanor melted hearts across Gotham. Not to mention his fortune.

It didn't hurt that he gave money to about a thousand different organizations within the city limits alone. It had a tendency to work out well for him. People were willing to bend the rules slightly.

So when he stopped in to Gotham General to see Dick's uncle, the staff was more than willing to give them privacy at his request despite the fact that the former acrobat normally had round the clock supervision.

"Please hurry Mr. Wayne. We still need to finish up with his usual hygiene routines." A nurse said as she excused herself from the room. Bruce turned on his charm and gave her a smile and a nod before entering the hospital room.

It was the best that money could by for a long term resident. There was a small flat screen TV, a large set of windows with sunlight peeking out through the shades, and a hospital bed that adjusted its' angle for the patient to sit upright if they wished. And it was all modified to respond to voice commands from the patient in question.

Rick Grayson had been a slight man in his heyday as an acrobat. Even more so now due to muscle atrophy. The fall that had killed so many of the other Graysons and left Dick an orphan also left Rick a quadriplegic. He had no feeling at all from the neck down. An incredibly cruel fate for one who once flew through the air. He had dark hair like the rest of the family, and it was long and unruly at the moment. Cutting his hair was likely one of the 'hygiene routines' the nurse had been talking about. Other than that, he was clean shaven and looking well. As well as one could under the circumstances that was.

Rick craned his neck to look at Bruce as he walked in and smiled at the man who had funded his hospital room and taken in his nephew. "Hello Mr. Wayne." He said, his eyes and smile blindingly bright. It made him look so much like Dick.

Bruce coughed into his fist in an awkward attempt to shake off the thought as he took a seat beside Richard's bed. "Hello to you too, Mr. Grayson." He said, laying on his 'Brucie' charm.

"Please. Call me Rick. Mr. Grayson was my father." Rick said with a small grin blooming on his face at his own bad joke. (1)

Bruce smiled back but internally he still felt dread clawing away at his insides. "Actually, that's what I came here to talk to you about." Bruce said, earning a questioning look from the patient which Bruce was quick to clarify. "It's about Dick actually."

Rick looked alarmed at the declaration, and Bruce could hardly blame him. Dick was all he had left. "Dick? Is he okay?"

Bruce shook his bowed head. "No. He's...he's very sick right now. It's not looking good. But his doctor said there might be something in your family's medical history that could shed some light on how to treat Dick."

Bruce felt the twinge of guilt in his stomach. He knew that what he was doing was wrong beyond words. He was preying on an innocent man's love for the last bit of family he had left in this world, and he was also relying on that man's paralysis to keep him from finding out that it wasn't true. Bruce was completely disgusted with himself over it. It was like bribing a starving child with food in exchange for information.

But regardless of the ethical turmoil, this was something he had to do. He had to find out for himself just how much the Graysons knew about their ancestry. Asking about the family's history was the only way to do that, and making Richard believe that it was the only way to save Dick's life was the only means he had of ensuring an honest answer.

Rick looked absolutely terrified at Bruce's explanation, causing another pang of guilt to hit the billionaire. Bruce suspected that if the man could still move he would jump out of bed and begin shaking Bruce by his shoulders. "Oh my God! Ask me anything you need!" He said, voice sounding desperate. More likely than not he felt stricken over the fact that his nephew could be dying and he couldn't so much as go and see him.

Bruce knew in that moment that he was a horrible human being. "First I need you to calm down. He's not in any mortal danger." There was no need to upset the poor man anymore than he already was. "What can you tell me about your father?"

"My dad? He was as healthy as a horse. I don't think he even got a cold once in his life." Rick said, beginning to calm down with the knowledge that Dick was not in immediate jeopardy.

Bruce nodded, and stuffed down his hesitance as he asked a much more important question. "And...your grandfather?"

"Oh God. He had some heart problems! Is that what's wrong with Dick?!" Rick asked. Again Bruce knew full well that if he were able to move he would be taking off to be at his nephew's bedside.

Bruce raised a hand to gesture for him to be calm before speaking. He hadn't been expecting a response like that, and he quickly realized Rick must have meant his other grandfather. "No it's...something else." Bruce said, deciding that being vague was best. "I didn't mean your mother's father. What can you tell me about your paternal grandfather?"

Rick's face scrunched up as though he had a bad taste in his mouth when Bruce asked the question. "Well...I don't really know anything about him. He and my grandmother died when my dad was just a baby."

"Really? Then how did your father end up at the circus, may I ask?"

Rick gave him a questioning look, no doubt wondering what his family tragedy had to with Dick's condition. Regardless, he decided to answer. "My granddad was a good friend of Mr. Haly apparently. After he died, Haly took my dad in to make sure he wouldn't end up in the system."

"And what was your grandfather's name?"

"William Grayson."

Bruce nodded slowly. The Court probably hadn't felt the need to change the first name. The name William was certainly common enough in that era.

Bruce got up from his seat and gave Rick a reassuring smile. "Don't worry about Dick. I'm getting him the best care that money can buy. He's going to be just fine."

Rick nodded and seemed to relax at the explanation. Bruce smiled genuinely before he turned to leave. "I'll send the nurses back in. Take care Rick."

Bruce thought he heard Rick say something back, but his mind was already going beginning to run through what he had been told.

That information seemed consistent with the Grayson's biography. There was little to no deviation. It may have even sounded rehearsed, but Bruce knew a liar when he met one. And Rick Grayson was no liar. He genuinely believed the information he had given Bruce was the truth, and the amount of concern he showed for Dick could not be faked. A man like that never would have allowed Dick to become a Talon. He didn't know anything.

But Bruce's mind still weighed heavy with unease. Rick didn't know anything, but what of the other Graysons? The file he read said that they had pondered the thought of making Dick's cousin a Talon as well. Johnny was a young teen when he had died. Was it possible that he knew what others had planned for him?

And what of John and Mary Grayson? Did they know of their son's so called 'destiny'? Haly certainly knew what the Court had planned. But would he have had the courage to alert the Graysons to the danger their youngest was in?

None of these possibilities were the ones that concerned Bruce the most though. There was one in particular that even the Dark Knight himself was afraid to approach...

He didn't have time to even consider it though. As soon as he stepped outside of the hospital doors, he saw a tall figure there already waiting for him. When he saw the black attire, Bruce's mind almost raced to Talon before he looked up.

Alfred was wearing his customary attire and looking at Bruce with his typical impassive expression. "We have to talk."

* * *

Alfred had taken to driving the car Bruce had taken to the hospital while Bruce stayed in the passengers' seat. Though he hadn't said a word other than needing to talk, Bruce got the sense that Alfred was annoyed with him. It more than likely had to due with Bruce all but forcing him to England, (Bruce made a mental note to found out how he got back in the first place) but he also sensed that the animosity went deeper than that.

Alfred was keeping his eyes on the rode and appeared to be taking him back to the manor, though Bruce remained at a loss for words. He was waiting for Alfred to to speak to him, perhaps explain what he was doing back and what they had to talk about.

Eventually Bruce caught on to why Alfred was giving him the silent treatment. His surrogate father expected him to be the first to speak. Alfred had no intention of explaining away what he was doing back in the States. He wanted Bruce to explain his conduct first.

Bruce sighed and rubbed his brow in frustration. Even he didn't hold up well against Alfred when the older man dissected someone to tell them what they did wrong.

"I'm not going to apologize, Alfred." Bruce began, knowing that this would not end well from the moment his breath left his mouth. "These people...these _owls_. They want to hurt me. And they know that the easiest way to do that is to strike at the people close to me. That's why they went after Lucius and-"

"Oh, please do shut up."

Bruce eyes bulged and he looked at Alfred as though he were an impostor. Alfred was now glaring at the road with fire in his eyes. Never once in all his years knowing the Englishman had he ever been that blunt, even when Bruce was at his most difficult. "Alfred-"

"Make no mistake Master Bruce," The butler interrupted as he rounded the corner. "I am none too pleased with the fact that you all but deported me in yet another contrived effort to keep me safe. But that is not the issue here. Miss Barbara and Master Jason contacted me and prompted my return. I _know_ about Master Dick."

A lump formed in Bruce's throat at Alfred's explanation. If those two had been the ones to inform him, Bruce had to imagine that they hadn't portrayed him in a particularly fond light. The both of them had been pressing him for days to inform Dick about what they had discovered. But...

...but he just _couldn't_.

"I can't tell him Alfred. You didn't see those Talons. These... _things_...they were innocent children whose talents were perverted and twisted in the most contemptible way. And the Court wants that for Dick. He's safer in Bludhaven. For now it looks like the Court's power ends at the city limits."

Alfred shook his head in mild disappointment at his employers' arrogance and his eyes softened. "Master Bruce, your heart is in the right place. I understand why you want to protect him from that secret. It would be a terrible thing for him to know. But the choice is not yours to make. It's his _family_. The longer you wait to tell him the truth, the more damage you will inflict to your already fragile bond with him. Lord forbid he should find out on his own. He will grow to resent you for hiding it, and you may lose him forever."

Bruce lowered his head and sighed. He wished it were that simple. Alfred was entirely right. If Bruce were being honest with himself, he knew from the start that Dick had a right to know the truth. If his only concern he been keeping Dick away from the Court, he likely would have told him already. But that _wasn't_ his only concern.

There was something else. Something far more heinous. Bruce hated himself for even considering it. It was a betrayal of everything he and Dick had gone through together. But the possibility was still very much there, and he couldn't let his emotions blind him.

"There's another reason that I can't go to him Alfred." Bruce said, dreading the words as he spoke them.

Alfred hummed in acknowledgment. "Do tell."

Bruce looked at Alfred. His face was rather impassive at the moment. He wasn't outright angry anymore. Though Bruce was about to undo his state of calm entirely.

Bruce sighed again and looked away from Alfred. He couldn't bring himself to look at his oldest friend as he admitted his largest concern. "Do you know what brood mimicry is?" He didn't wait for a response before continuing. "It's a common strategy among certain species of birds. A bird will go and seek out a rival's nest. Once that is done, they wait for an opening and lay their egg inside the enemy nest. In essence, they trick their enemy into raising their own young for them. And once the hatchling has grown large enough, it kills the host and claims the nest as their own."

Bruce gulped as he finished the analogy. "The Court selected which women the Graysons would reproduce with. They _bred_ Dick to kill me. We know that much. And the story as we know it would suggest that I got to him before the Court did. But...do we _really_ know that to be true? Can I guarantee that the Court of Owls never made contact with the Graysons directly? Because if I can't..."

He moaned painfully. Getting the words out was now like a physical wrench. "...If I can't, I have no choice but to assume that the Court of Owls _did_ get to him before me. That he's been the enemy bird that they snuck into the nest. For all I know...the Richard Grayson I thought I raised never existed at all."

It was a horrifying possibility and it turned Bruce's stomach into knots. But his disgust made it no less real.

The Court of Owls had their watchful eyes on Dick's family for a very long time. They had as much as prophesied Dick's birth and roll as a Talon. It was entirely possible that they decided to take an interest in him earlier than the other Talons. And if that was the case, then Dick could have been turned into a sleeper agent before they ever met.

Ever since they discovered the truth about the original Roy Harper being replaced by a clone, it caused a chill to pass through the Justice League. Every hero began to look at their protege and couldn't help but think to themselves, _'is it possible?'_. People had been conspiring to destroy the League from the inside since its' founding. And they knew that the way to strike at them was through their children.

The Court of Owls was not unlike the Light. Aside from goals and overall influence, there was really only one thing that differentiated the two organizations. While the Light wanted to eradicate the League as a whole, the Court of Owls had targeted him specifically.

Bruce didn't trust anyone, but he did trust Dick. If ever there were a way to get to him, it would be through his ~~son~~ partner.

And now that something like this had come forward...Bruce had no choice but to consider it.

He had to strangle back tears when the thought first came to him. The idea of the smiling little boy he had taken in being no more than an act...

What truly terrified Bruce was just how likely that case was to be true. He wanted so desperately to deny it. To throw caution to the wind and pronounce that he didn't believe it. That Dick was his son, and Bruce would never doubt him.

If only it were that simple.

When Ollie first got Roy back after all those months he had been missing, he had been too overwhelmed with relief to see what was right in front of his eyes. He had been blinded by hope, and that made him weak. It allowed a virus to creep inside their walls and nearly destroy them all. That one mistake had nearly destroyed the entire League.

If Bruce was to get to the bottom of this, hope was a luxury he could not afford.

It was ironic, in a sense. Dick was the very personification of hope. The light to Batman's darkness. And now, he would have to cast that off. To rid himself of sentiment like hope or faith, and look at it with cold and dispassionate eyes.

That meant that for the time being, Dick Grayson wasn't his partner, his ward, or his son.

Dick Grayson was a _suspect_.

The next thing Bruce knew, he was violently thrust against the window of the car as it suddenly jolted to the side in a sharp turn. Other cars honked as they narrowly avoided a collision with the offending vehicle. Bruce looked to Alfred to find out what was happening, and what he saw almost caused him to choke.

Alfred was practically red, and anger was rolling off of him in waves. If Bruce didn't know any better, he would say the older man was out for blood.

Suddenly, Bruce was a little boy again being stared down by a less than happy Alfred after running away from home the night after his parents' funeral. He had made it less than a mile into the woods when the small search party Alfred assembled found him. After the butler politely thanked the officers who found him, he stormed over to the young boy and gave him the most severe verbal lashing he had received in his life. He never raised a hand to Bruce though. Alfred was never violent. That was more Bruce's domain. Instead he dissected Bruce and told him in excruciating, painful detail why what he had done was so horrendous.

_"Your mother and father died so that you could live! How dare you dishonor that by doing something like this?!"_

Those words had stayed with Bruce well into his adult life. He still risked his life on a daily basis, but never again would he do it without need. He was going to die. Everyone had to sometime. But that day, Alfred taught him that if he when he did die, he would be carrying his parent's sacrifice with him. So he'd better damn well make his life _and_ his death mean something.

Alfred's violent driving came to a quite literal screeching halt when he pulled into the driveway of a vacant lot and spun the car around to park it in the dead center. Once he finally stopped the car, he tuned and gave Bruce a glare the likes of which Batman could never hope to resemble. "You foolish boy!" If it hadn't been for the fact that Alfred had never once raised a hand to him during his formative years, Bruce would be certain that his oldest friend was going to crack him across the cheek. "How dare you!"

Bruce raised his hands in a sort of half defensive and half surrendering posture in a vain effort to calm the butler down. "I'm sorry Alfred but it's just too convenient. The boy I took in just so happens to be the boy that the Owls preordained to kill me? It's entirely plausible that-"

"Shut your mouth!"

Alfred turned a new shade of red as Bruce scrambled to justify his suspicion. It didn't take a detective to know that Alfred had to put a physical effort into not slamming Bruce face first into the dashboard to shatter his nose. Instead, he closed his eyes and breathed through his nose, turning away from Bruce and facing the windshield again. The strained look remained on his face though, and his eyes remained closed when he next spoke. He more than likely couldn't bring himself to look at Bruce.

"Master Bruce, I have allowed you much leeway with how you treat your charges. The training, the combat, the infernal Robin mantle. I tolerated it all against my better judgement. But _this_ -" Alfred said, his voice like steel as he turned back to Bruce with a new glare at the ready. " _Will. Not. Stand._ I love those boys like they were my own. If you wish to investigate this further, than by all means do so if it will sate your ego. But _you will not_ question Master Dick's integrity in my presence. I will _not_ allow it. He has given you _everything_. For _seven years_ that boy has given you his heart and soul. And you Master Bruce...you just proved that you never deserved him."

If each of his words had been like a punch in the gut, than the end of Alfred's speech was like a bullet to the heart.

It shouldn't have affected him nearly as much as it did. After all, he knew from the moment he began to consider Dick a suspect that it was a betrayal of their entire relationship and everything they had been through together. The second he began down that line of thinking he was fully aware that it could and more than likely would do irrevocable damage to their already fragile relationship. In fact, there was a very good chance that after all was said and done Dick would never speak to him again.

Bruce had done his best to mentally strengthen himself after he discovered William Cobb's connection to Dick. He set a goal in his mind that he would not allow anything to overwhelm him with that sense of dread again. He thought he had been successful in strengthening his barriers.

In just a few words, Alfred had effectively shattered that delusion.

_"You never deserved him."_

Realistically Bruce would have preferred a bullet to the heart. At least than he wouldn't be alive long enough to dwell in the pain of the wound.

Bruce turned away from the butler and starred ahead blankly at the road, eyes unseeing. He was fairly sure that Alfred had started the car again based on the rumbling in the background, but it was quickly drowned out by the sound of his own thoughts.

_"You never deserved him."_

What could he even say to that? Alfred was right to be upset with him of course. That was not in dispute. He was even justified in attacking his employer in such a manner that was intentionally designed to hurt him. What Bruce struggled with the most was the fact that Alfred could really think so little of him.

Didn't Alfred understand? It's not like he _wanted_ Dick to be one of them. The thought of it turned his stomach in knots. But the possibility was there. And if it were true...God forbid if it were true, then he couldn't afford to give Dick the benefit of the doubt.

Alfred clearly didn't appreciate just how much this affected Bruce. To know that the boy that was meant to lighten up his darkness had no small amount of darkness in himself. Not only that, but Dick's ancestors apparently had a long history of doing away with any members of the Wayne family that the Court deemed a threat. Bruce knew full well that it was in no way fair to deliver the sins of the grandfather on Dick's head, but it wasn't an easy thing to overlook.

Bruce's parents may have been murdered by Joe Chill, but if it hadn't been for William Cobb he would have had some manner of family to help him through the ordeal. Uncles, aunts, and cousins. Descendants of the people that would have lived if not for Cobb. Instead, he had to go through it all alone.

Bruce had to shake his head to clear out such thoughts. He was going through enough turmoil without dragging his family into it. Once he did, he could now clearly see through the rapidly changing scenery of his window that they were indeed driving again. Towards the manor if Bruce knew the streets correctly.

He made the mistake of turning towards his driver. Alfred's anger clearly hadn't faded. He looked worse if anything. The fact that Alfred had been willing to vocalize his anger without any form of restraint for the sake of manners spoke volumes about just how badly Bruce had screwed up.

But Alfred's disapproval didn't change a thing.

Bruce had another reason for keeping Dick out of it.

Even if Dick wasn't affiliated with the Court in anything other than blood, a possibility which Bruce desperately wanted to be true, revealing that connection to Dick would do more harm than good. Haly had said it himself in his letter. Family was everything to Dick. The only reason Bruce hadn't finalized anything and made him Richard Wayne was because of how much the Flying Graysons were a part of who Dick was. If he ever found out the truth about his childhood...

If he found out that Haly, a man he had loved like a grandfather, had been willing to hand him over to a life of torture and murder...

If he found out what the Court had planned for him since the moment they first saw him perform...

If he found out about the horrors and atrocities that his great-grandfather had visited upon the Wayne family...

Bruce shuddered to think of the damage that Cobb's legacy would do to Richard.

It would shatter his entire world to have that burden suddenly thrust upon him. Even as he watched his boy grow into a fine young man, Bruce could see it clearly. Even though he had faced the very worst that the world had to offer, Dick was still innocent in his own way. He wasn't like Bruce. He hadn't been corrupted by his tragedies, nor by the things he had seen since then. But something like this...

If ever there were something to push his boy over the edge...

Bruce would be damned if he allowed Dick to be hurt by this. He would protect him, and this secret would be his burden to carry alone.

This was the right thing. He was sure of it.

But as they continued towards Wayne Manor, Alfred's words continued to echo through his mind.

_"You never deserved him."_

_"You never deserved him."_

_"You never deserved him."_

* * *

_That Night_

Batman had just come back from a long night of investigative work. It was no easy task to do something like this when it landed so close to home. But it was still something that had to be done.

He had started by checking Rick's story. Everything he said about the Grayson family history checked out. It did on paper anyway.

The Court had been diligent in creating a false background for the Graysons in an effort to prevent anyone from finding a link to William Cobb and compromising their secrecy. There was no small amount of documentation, going back several generations. There was even a gravestone in Gotham's cemetery with the name _William Grayson_ inscribed on it. But underneath that headstone, there was nothing in the coffin but bricks.

That wasn't the only grave that Batman had been forced to disturb.

Afterwards, went back to the Wayne family's private cemetery which was only a few minutes walk behind the manor. From what Bruce had gathered from Cobb's file, his family had been killing Waynes for centuries. It was William who took it a step further. Before him, the killings of Waynes was very spread out to avoid suspicion. Not every generation of Cobb's family did it, and when they did it was a single death at most. William however murdered several members of Bruce's family.

Besides Alan Wayne, the files claimed that Cobb also murdered Alan's brothers and sisters, along with two of his children. After this the Waynes became more paranoid about their security and fortified the mansion. That seemed to cause William to back off to some degree, but there were more suspicious deaths that he could have been accountable for.

With that in mind, Batman was left to single-handedly dig up his own family members.

Every single Wayne who died since Alan. He didn't bother to bring their bodies back to the cave for examination. That would take too much time. He only looked at their remains to see if there were any obvious signs of foul play.

From his initial findings, it would have been easier to list the Waynes who _hadn't_ been murdered. There were a series of knife wounds and broken necks waiting for him in those coffins. It came as no surprise. Autopsies were very unsophisticated in the day and age in which these people died. Even if signs of murder were obvious, the Court could have bought off any coroner or police officer. It all came down to greed in the end after all.

Once it was over, Bruce finally laid his family back to rest and let out a long sigh as he made his way back to the manor.

Twelve Waynes in total. Probably more that even the Court of Owls didn't know about. William was a master assassin. He knew how to commit murder without arousing suspicion. And over the years, he had clearly developed a vendetta against the Wayne family. And now, there was only one Wayne left.

Though if he were being honest with himself, finding out that William Cobb was apparently dedicated towards the destruction of the Wayne line didn't mean much to him. It didn't solve his primary problem at all.

He hadn't come any closer to finding out if Dick knew about the Court.

The fact that the Court went to such lengths to fabricate a history for the Graysons did work in his favor though. Because the Graysons weren't particularly well known, there wouldn't have been much need to be so elaborate in their deceit unless they intended to keep the Graysons in the dark as well.

But it was just as possible that the Court had created this story for the Graysons to recite in case they were ever questioned. The evidence he had so far could go either way.

Before the night was over though, Bruce would have his answer.

And he would hate himself for it...

Bruce finally came back in through the cave when it began. He started by heading towards the cryotanks to make sure the Talons were still in stasis. Even though he felt some semblance of reassurance checking in on them, looking at their faces was still... _difficult_ to say the least.

It was foolish. These weren't the children they appeared to be. They hadn't been for sometime. Despite their outward appearance, they were born long before him. But when he looked at them, his mind brought him back to the photos and portraits he had found of them on the internet.

They didn't resemble Dick in their outward appearance and they were distant relatives of the Graysons like Cobb was (Bruce had checked), but it was still disturbing. As children, they had this certain way about them. A spark in their eyes that spoke to an untamable spirit. He had seen that spark in Dick's eyes every time he dawned the Robin suit, and it continued into his days as Nightwing.

It was disturbing beyond words to see that spirit had been broken in these individuals. In another life, they all could have been great heroes in their own right just like Dick was. But they were far removed from heroes now.

Bruce knew better though. He knew that they weren't outright villains, and despite their appearance, they weren't monsters either. They were still just small, damaged children who never got the chance to see out their potential.

Bruce breathed heavily as he turned away from them and made his way to the main computer. He still had to catalog what he had discovered and document the Wayne deaths. It seemed that William favored throwing knives, which made sense given his profession before the Court.

It was when he finally went over to the Batcomputer that his reckoning began.

It began nothing like the night he became aware of the Court. It didn't begin with a voice like thunder telling him that the Court of Owls had sentenced him to die. Rather, it began with a voice strewn with almost childlike concern and innocence.

"Bruce?"

Batman stopped dead in his tracks. Of all the people he had been prepared to greet him in the cave, this was not one of them. More to the point, it was not someone he was yet ready to face.

That was what he thought anyway.

Batman remained in his position as he turned slowly to face the source of the voice.

And the moment that his white lenses met with Nightwing's, Bruce thoughts drew him back in time to when things looked just a little brighter.

He remembered the screaming in the middle of the night. Running into Dick's room to make sure he was okay. The boy crying into his shoulder as images of his family laying broken on the floor flashed before his eyes.

He remembered some nights that Dick would escape from his own room and crawl into Bruce's king sized bed. Waking up to find his ward curled tightly into his chest. The warmth the spread through him as he took in the sight of the sleeping child.

He remembered the trapeze equipment he set up in the cave. The way Dick's face lit up when he was allowed to fly again. The laughter that echoed through the cave; a foreign sound in such a dark place.

He remembered the first time Dick called him Dad. He had just tucked Dick in after a long night of patrol, and wished Dick a good night. He was just heading out when he caught his ward's whispered words.

_"Good night, Dad."_

Bruce remembered it all. The love and affection. The heartache and comfort. The trust and companionship.

But most of all, he remembered the suspicion and doubts. Those that had accompanied him ever since he learned of Dick's heritage. The ones that had been keeping him up every night over the last week.

Batman was a pragmatist. He didn't make choices based on what he felt. He made them on what he knew to be fact. In their line of work, allowing one's self to be guided by the heart rather than the head could get people killed. That had been an unshakable part of his character, especially in his earlier career.

But Dick was...he was...

He was Bruce's _everything_. His partner. His protege. His ward. His confidant. And adoption papers or no, he was Bruce's _son_.

Dear God, _his son_.

It had been terrifyingly easy to suspect Dick of being a traitor. Terrifying still that even Alfred hadn't been able to talk him out of such a foolish notion. And the reason it had been easy was because Dick wasn't _there_. He had been off in Bludhaven, still acting like Bruce didn't exist. After several months of no contact, except for the occasional screaming match between Nightwing and Batman, it had even been _tempting_ to think that Dick had never really been loyal to him.

But as Bruce looked at him, face twisted in concern and directed at a man who had just kicked him out of the cave mere months ago, the delusion Bruce had blinded himself with slipped away like mist.

Dick was no traitor. He wasn't _capable_ of betrayal. He was only capable of unrestrained joy and kindness.

But Bruce had betrayed everything he stood for by suspecting Dick.

"What is going on?" Dick asked, features still contorted with worry.

"How did you...who called you here?" At that moment, he could only think of the obvious questions. He nearly asked Dick how he found out about Bruce investigation, but decided against it. He still didn't know how much Dick knew.

Surely Alfred wouldn't have told him. Even if the butler had outright called him a fool for hiding something this big from Dick, he never would have told the boy directly. They stood in agreement that if he should hear it from anyone, he should hear it from Bruce. Barbara and Jason maybe, but he would have known if they had been planning something behind his back.

Dick sighed and shook his head, rubbing a hand up against his brow like he had a headache.

"For a detective you are a very stupid man." Dick let out with a long breath. "I'm friends with the staff that treats my uncle you idiot. The moment you left the hospital I got a panicked call from the staff and my uncle both asking if I was okay. Turns out I have some life threatening illness that required you charging in to ask all about my family."

Of course he had. Bruce had somehow managed to forget about Dick's knack for making friends with everyone he met, both in and out of the mask. Being confronted on his visiting of Dick's uncle though, stung far more than the direct insults. "Dick-"

"And then," Dick said without heat or anger in his voice. He was merely interrupting Bruce to finish his thought. "I come to the cave about ready to rip your head off, both for doing that behind my back and for making my uncle worry about me. But when I walk in here, what do I find but three dead bodies hung up in pods like trophies." Dick explained with a gesture at the three Talons in stasis. He wasn't wrong. They did look, and for all intents and purposes were, dead.

"Look," Dick started, his hands raised in a surrendering gesture. "I'm not going to stand here and pretend that I'm not confused or angry with you because I am. You had no right to go behind my back to interrogate the only family I have left. I don't know what possessed you to start poking around my family history, but you should have told me and you know it. I'm supposed to be your partner. That means you're supposed to trust me. But..." Dick said with his voice beginning to trail off. He had a pinched look on is face and his expression was a cross between annoyance and guilt. "Bruce...I...I'm _sorry_."

Bruce' eyes threatened to bulge out of his head they were so wide with shock. _Dick_ was sorry?! For what? Bruce had been the one to go behind his back. To keep secrets from him. And even though he probably didn't know about it yet, suspected him of being a turncoat. "What are you talking about?"

"You heard me." Dick said as he looked up at his guardian with sad and guilty eyes. "I'm really sorry Bruce. I never wanted to put you in a position where you felt like you couldn't come to me. Things have been... _difficult_ since you adopted Jason. I know I didn't make it any better by dropping out of school and joining the police academy. But despite what you might think Bruce, I didn't do that just to upset you. I love helping people. I just wanted the chance to do it both in and out of the mask. I swear, you're never going to see my service weapon. I won't bring it within miles of Gotham.

"And Jason...well...I think I get that too. He's a good kid who got dealt a really bad hand. I think I understand the adoption now. You were pretty young when I came into your life. And I already had parents. Parents who I loved and who loved me back. Jason didn't have that. We both know what his home life was like. I was just being jealous and petty. I love that kid too, and he couldn't ask for a better father.

"I'm so sorry I iced you out. I didn't mean to make you feel like you couldn't trust me. If someone's after you or Gotham, I'll be there for you in a heartbeat."

Bruce's head continued to spin. For months, he had wanted to hear those words more than anything. To repair the relationship he had with Dick and make their bond strong once again. It was tempting beyond words to go through with it now, and put everything else behind them. Forget about Cobb and the Court and just be father and son for a moment. But...

...but he just _couldn't_.

He couldn't just let something like that stay buried forever. Or worse, allow it to stay hidden and run the risk of Dick finding out on his own. Alfred had been right, as was usually the case. Dick would grow to resent him for keeping something that so directly impacted him.

That didn't make Bruce's responsibility any easier though. How in the world was he meant to go about telling his son that the only reason that he existed was to kill the man who raised him? That he had been bred for violence and cruelty and death like some sort of animal propagated for hunting? That if it hadn't been for the death of his entire family, the single worst moment of his entire life, that he would have become a hideous monster?

If someone could have sparred Bruce that awful truth, he would have taken it as a gift from God. But not only did he have to live with that revelation, he had to inflict it onto someone else now. Someone who he loved with all his heart.

Dick seemed oblivious to his guardian's inner turmoil though. He cast his gaze on the pods that held the Talons with an look of unease. He still thought they were dead, Bruce realized.

"Look, I know you have your reasons, but I'm still going to need one hell of an explanation." Dick said as he turned to Bruce, still not picking up on his distress. "Who are those people? Why do they look like that? How did they die? And what the hell does my family have to do with it?"

Dick's brows were furrowed in a questioning look, and Bruce wished more than anything he could leave Dick in that state. That blissful ignorance to the situation at hand. He even envied it to some degree. A state of bliss that he would now have to obliterate.

"I can only answer one question at a time." Bruce responded weakly as he slowly approached Nightwing.

Nightwing nodded and gestured back to the Talons. "How did they die then?"

Batman let out the smallest sigh of relief that he hadn't asked anything directly related to their connection with the Court. "They're not dead. At least, not in the way you would usually define death."

Nightwing gave him an odd look. "What does that even mean?"

Bruce gestured for Dick to take a seat, knowing that this explanation would go on for sometime and that it would be best for him to be sitting down when he heard the bulk of it. Dick did so as he answered. "They've been infused with a powerful chemical called electrum, and genetically modified to heal from wounds and never age or grow ill. They died a long time ago Dick. But their bodies were prepared to be reanimated with the electrum. Keeping them hooked up like that is all I can do to keep them secured."

Dick's interest in the conversation seemed to spark halfway through Bruce's explanation, and he was quick to pursue the thing that stood out to him the most. "Prepared? By who?"

Bruce let out a long breath. "The Court of Owls."

Batman waited for Nightwing to do or say something in response. To ask for a further explanation. To remark that there was no Court of Owls like Bruce had. Even to recite the rhyme like Barbara. But he remained silent, and seemed to accept the information as though it weren't a surprise to hear.

A knot tied itself in Batman's chest as he said, "You're not surprised?"

Dick gave him the smallest of smiles in an effort to lighten the mood. "You too Bruce? All of you seem to forget that I'm not actually from Gotham. I didn't grow up with that story like you or Babs or Jason must have. I mean, yeah. There's a secret cult that runs Gotham. That's pretty screwed up. But it doesn't really pull the rug out from under me like it must have for you three."

Bruce nodded at Dick's clarification. That made sense. For the shortest of moments the fear that Dick may have already known about the Court reignited in him, and he mentally berated himself for relapsing to that state of mind so quickly. He had just freed himself from that delusion, and now was no time to revisit it.

"So if the Court of Owl is real, I guess that makes them the Talons?" Dick asked for confirmation as nudged again towards the dormant assassins. "I didn't think there was more than one of them."

Bruce looked down. "There normally isn't. It appears that they only have one active Talon at a time. But when the active Talon retires or dies, their body is preserved for resurrection if the Court needs them again."

This time Dick did pick up on Bruce's obvious distress, and got up out of his seat to walk up to his mentor. "What's going on with you Bruce? I've never seen you like this. This stuff is pretty messed up, but it's nothing worse than what we've seen before."

Bruce was nowhere near ready to come clean about the exact reason for being so distraught. But he needed to get to the point eventually. For the moment, a half-truth would settle. "One of the Talons. William Cobb. He was reanimated like the others, and was sent here to kill Bruce Wayne and Jason Todd a few weeks ago." Dick's face lit up with panic, which Bruce was quick to defuse. "We're both fine. No one was even injured. But Cobb...he's not like the others. He lived in the early twentieth century and...evidence suggests that members of his family have...taken up a very specific tradition within the Court. They were born and bred to...kill Waynes."

Dick looked at him in horror and sympathy. He knew better than most just how much family meant to Bruce. To learn this William Cobb and his kind had been systematically working to end that family must have been devastating. It was no wonder that he was behaving this way. "God Bruce. I'm so sorry."

Even though the words were meant to comfort the Dark Knight, it only made him feel worse. He should be the one apologizing to Dick, not the other way around. And he hadn't even begun on the worst part of it. That as far as William and his evil family was concerned, Dick was included among them. "That's...that's not all Dick."

Dick looked at him with an eagerness to help in his eyes. It only made the task at hand all the more difficult. What kind of person was Bruce that he was about to shatter Dick's whole world? "What is it? Is it anything that I can help with?"

 _"You're one of them."_ A voice in Bruce's mind shot back sharply. _"Your family has been killing mine for generations. Haly never cared about you. He was raising you like a pig for slaughter. And the death of your family? You should be grateful. If it wasn't for that you would have ended up a mindless monster as well."_

Batman scrubbed a gloved hand over his face, and then lifted his fingers to remove the cowl. This was not a conversation for Batman and Nightwing. Dread grew in his heart by the minute, so he spoke before it could spread any further. "It's the recruitment process for the Talons. They selected their assassins from a very unusual source. A circus."

That caused something to spark in Dick's eyes, but Bruce kept going. "In death, they became Talons. But in life..." Bruce trailed off as he finally brought himself to look up at Dick again. Nightwing had removed his mask, probably when Batman had removed the cowl. His blue eyes emitted a aura of kindness and hope and something that Bruce could only describe as innocence. "My God, Dick. In life, all three were performers. They worked for Haly's Circus."

It was clear to Dick by how slow he was taking it that Bruce meant to ease him into the truth. But the weight of his words felt nothing live being eased into water. Rather, it felt like being thrown off the deck of a ship and hitting the water head on. His heart did a nosedive, and his mind whirled with the implications as Bruce went on.

"When I found that out, I looked deeper into Haly's. There have been a number of unexplained deaths at the circus, most of which I believe were faked. Among the list of those who supposedly died were three young performers. Adam and Michael Duran, and Cecilia Wright. Those three are the Talons I currently have in holding. Dick...I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I wanted so badly to protect you from this but...Haly's isn't a circus in anything but name. It's a breeding ground for future generations of assassins."

Dick shook his head violently and narrowed his eyes on Bruce in the fiercest glare he could muster as his head mind still worked to process what he had just heard. No. He had _just_ apologized to Bruce. That didn't magically make the last few months of ignoring each other disappear. He was still very angry at Bruce over everything, and this accusation was bringing that rage back with a vengeance. Bruce had no right to accuse Haly. "No. No! I don't care what your investigation told you Bruce! I was there! You think I wouldn't notice something like that! You're wrong Bruce! Haly would neve- _Hrrrk!_ "

Dick's rant was brought to a very sudden halt when Bruce grabbed the underside of his jaw to force his mouth open and unceremoniously stock his gloved fingers inside. While Dick forced himself not to gag on the foreign material in his mouth and grabbed Bruce's wrist in a vain effort to pry his father's hand from his mouth, Dick felt a small pop before Bruce pulled his fingers out on his own.

Dick backed away from Bruce, shaken by the unusual action. Then he took notice of something Bruce was holding between his index finger and his thumb. It was tooth. Dick shifted his tongue around and confirmed that there was an empty socket where a tooth had just been, but it was strange. He didn't feel any pain, and there was no root in that tooth. Moreover in the cavity that was left by the extraction of the tooth, Dick thought he tasted metal.

"The electrum in the Talon's bloodstream was administered over a long period of time. It was done by placing a coin inside of a false tooth before they even began training." Dick felt his stomach drop as Bruce continued to explain, not liking where the conversation was going. Slowly, raised the tooth in his hand before turning it over to reveal a golden coin with an owl emblem carved into it. Dick clapped a hand over his mouth and subconsciously pressed a finger to the spot where his tooth had just been.

In Dick, Bruce raised a detective. He put together the information at an alarming rate, but his mind was acting against his will. It was like the pieces of a puzzle were coming together all their own, no matter how much Dick wanted them to remain separate.

Dick turned again to the Talons. This time he looked at them not as corpses, but as actual people that were being detained. He saw their black veins. Their deathly pale skin. The multiple scars that covered nearly every inch of bare flesh.

 _"That could have been you."_ A voice in his mind whispered.

"I...I..." Dick began, but he honestly didn't know what to say. How was he supposed to react to something like this.

"You were supposed to be a Talon, Dick." Bruce said, ripping off the bandage as fast as he could. His mistake was thinking it would somehow make the revelation less painful.

Dick felt his legs grow weak and suddenly he was in the chair again. Every ounce of energy drained from him all at once, and he felt completely paralyzed as Bruce continued. "Every generation, one or more children would be taken from Haly's Circus. Those who showed the most potential, and power. Those children would then be trained under the most brutal conditions to become the Talons for that era. You were meant to be the most recent one. But then your family..." Not even Batman had the perseverance to finish that statement.

Dick felt his eyes begin to sting as he recalled that night. The screams of his loved ones. The crunching of bones. The broken bodies. It was without exception the worst moment of his life. And if it hadn't happened, a far worse fate would have befallen him.

Bruce could see the shock and dismay on Dick's face as clear as day. Unfortunately, he was not done exposing the skeletons of the Grayson family's closet. "I went over files that the Court kept on your family, Dick. For centuries, they've had a prophecy. One of a Talon from Cobb's family that would be unlike any the world had seen. They describe that Talon as a child born of black and white. A Gray Son."

"Stop." Dick whispered. His heart was constricting in his chest, and he couldn't breathe. This was too much. He couldn't listen anymore. "Please stop."

Bruce's heart sank. He couldn't. Not yet. He had to get it all out now or he would never find the nerve to say it ever again. "I took a sample of DNA from the assassin that tried to kill me. Dick, I am so sorry, but William Cobb is your great grandfather."

"Stop it!" Dick yelled, even as his voice broke. "That's not-! That can't be-!" Bruce watched as his ward began to shake with frustration at not being able to voice his thoughts, before placing a hand over his mouth again. "'gonna be sick."

He swayed as he ran towards the edge of the cave. There was a steel rail at the edge of the platform that separated them from the crevice below. Dick just barely made it there before hurling over the side. Bruce rushed to his side, and when Dick looked up and took a breath in, Bruce could tell he was beginning to cry. "It's not true. It's not..."

Bruce placed a strong hand on the center of Dick's back and rubbed a small circle. He was already beginning to wish he had gone on keeping secrets, and ignored Alfred and the others for all it was worth. He may have had a right to know, but Bruce could tell just how much this knowledge was hurting Dick.

Bruce was fully prepared to make the next move. To pull Dick into a warm embrace as they had done so many times before. To tell him that it was all okay, and that it changed nothing. That even if the Owls thought they had some claim to him, they would have to go through Batman to get him.

Instead, Dick suddenly pulled away from his touch like it burned. He whipped around to face Bruce, and gave him a look that his mentor had never seen before. When he spoke, Bruce felt something inside of him shatter.

"You knew." He whispered through the shock, blue eyes wide with terror and realization. "Oh God, you knew."

It took Bruce a moment to decipher the underlying meaning. That Bruce hadn't found out about the Court during his investigation. That he had been aware for much longer, and willfully hid it from Dick.

Bruce shook his head vehemently. No! That wasn't true at all! He had been just as shocked as anyone to discover this. Maybe even more horrified by the truth than Dick was. "That's not-"

"Is that the reason that you took me in?" Dick interrupted, a pained look on his face like someone had just punched him in the gut. "What, was I supposed to be some kind of link to get you closer to the Court?"

Bruce flinched from the sheer horror of the accusation. Did Dick really believe he was that cruel? "Of course not! Dick, I would never-"

"Shut up!" Dick screamed as he buried his face in his hands and moved them to the side of his head, yanking at black strands. "Oh my God. Oh my God, I feel so stupid. I thought the reason you didn't adopt me was because you weren't ready. But now I finally get it. I'm not your son, I'm just another case for you! I'm just a walking talking piece of evidence for you to get to the Court of Owls!"

"That's not true at all!" Bruce pleaded. "Dick, I swear I had no idea about any of this. You know the reason I took you in. I knew what it was like to be orphaned so young, and I wanted to be there for you. If I had known..."

Bruce trailed off, knowing he shouldn't have said that last part. He began it like he had something else to add, but in fact he didn't know what he would have done if he was fully aware of Dick's heritage. He'd like to say that he had the strength of character to overlook it, and take in Dick anyway. But in his heart, Bruce knew that would be a lie.

"If you had known what?" Dick pressed, eyes glistening. "That I was born to kill y-" Dick cut himself off. No matter how angry or hurt he felt, the thought of killing Bruce made him feel physically ill.

"None of that matters." Bruce said, attempting to approach Dick slowly as though he were a skittish animal. "It doesn't matter what they wanted you to be, or what I might have done then. I took you in, and I don't regret it even for a moment."

Dick wanted desperately to believe that. To believe that this didn't change a thing. But his mind was a jumbled mess with everything Bruce had just forced on him. He always trusted Bruce, but he had also trusted Haly. He didn't know what to think. And when Bruce put his hand on Dick's shoulder, it pushed him over the edge. He was in no mood for physical contact right now.

"Don't touch me!" Dick screamed as he slapped Bruce's hand away from him. Before Bruce could attempt to make contact again, Dick was snatching the keys to his motorcycle off the desk and running towards it. "Don't follow me!" He yelled as he got on his bike, fists clenched and chest heaving.

Before Bruce could even think of going after him, the bike is roaring as Dick drove it out of the cave.

Neither of them were expecting their first reunion after so long to go like that.

* * *

_A few hours later_

Bruce knew that going after Dick after all that was aired would be a poor choice. He at least knew that much. Sending Jason and Barbara to his apartment had been the next best option.

To some degree, Bruce had to wonder if Dick's reaction was some sort of cosmic justice working its' way through them. He had suspected Dick of betraying him, so why not let Dick suspect him of doing the same?

Bruce finally understood what a hypocrite he was. When Superboy had first entered the fray, Clark hadn't taken well to it. Bruce had been the one to confront him on it, and tell him that the fact the boy had been created to kill him was irrelevant. Conner was capable of making his own choices, and he chose to rid himself of Cadmus. At the time, Clark had told him that he could lecture him when the same thing happened to him.

It seemed the universe had a sick sense of humor.

Dick's situation was nearly identical to the one Clark had faced with Superboy. And Bruce hadn't practiced what he preached. He allowed his fears to overpower his better judgement. And now Dick was paying the price for it.

If the Court of Owls did manage to get to Dick when all of this was over, it would be Bruce's fault for making it so damned easy.

Pushing that aside for the time being, Bruce looked up to the screen to face Barbara's live chat. "How's he holding up?"

Barbara was seated in front of her laptop in Dick's apartment, looking downtrodden. In the background Bruce though he heard Dick and Jason talking, but he couldn't make out any words.

"I think he'll be okay." Barbara answered. If she were being honest with herself though, she was only saying that to comfort Bruce. Dick was still beside himself. Between learning his family history and then finding out that Bruce had worked to hide it from him, he had been put through the wringer. "You should have listened to me Bruce. If you had just told him about this from the beginning you could have avoided this."

"I had to protect-"

"Who? Dick or yourself?"

Bruce looked at Barbara with betrayal, beginning to worry that Dick's suspicions had rubbed off on her. "Barbara you can't believe what he's accusing me of."

"No, but I certainly understand why he thinks it." She answered, a tad sharply.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"What does it mean?" Barbara repeated incredulously. Was Bruce really that blind? "Have you even stopped a moment and taken a good long hard look at the way you operate? Bruce, you have a mission and it's a noble one but sometimes the way you go about it...I admire you a lot Bruce. But sometimes you scare me with how far you're willing to go."

"That may be true, but I won't apologize for putting the mission first." Bruce said, pounding his fist on the desk in frustration. "And that has absolutely nothing to do with what's happening now."

"I disagree. Dick has seen the way you work too. You lie to the Justice League constantly. You send the Team out on black op missions they don't even know the purpose of. You keep secret black files on how to bring down members of the League if they ever became a threat. For God's sake. You even suspected Dick of being a mole for the Court of Owls. You treat people like pieces on a chessboard long enough and it's not that unreasonable to assume you might also have taken in an orphan for the sake of the mission."

Bruce rubbed his temple where a headache was beginning to form, no longer in the mood to continue this conversation. "Just keep me posted. I still have work to do. Keep him safe."

Barbara gave him a sad look. "I will." With that, the screen cut to black and she hung up.

Once she was gone, Bruce hung his head in shame. He supposed to some extent he deserved this. Not only as karma for suspecting Dick, but also because of the way he had acted around him. Always making the mission the priority instead of his children.

And now here he was, alone in his mansion while one of his sons worked to repair the damage he had done to the other.

But he didn't plan on remaining in the mansion for long. There was still somewhere he had to be.

The sewer system where Alan Wayne died.

* * *

Bruce looked through enough city records to find the exact location where Alan Wayne fell into the sewers.

He had examined all the Waynes who had died since Alan, but one of them he found something interesting. Traces of marble beneath their nails. Almost as though they were clawing at something. There was no obvious connection, since the sewer system was almost entirely granite and lime. Still, it was the only lead he had left.

Bruce scoured the entire area for hours, in no small part working off the nervous energy that his fight with Dick had left him with. He looked over every square inch of the walls and the water. He had taken a few samples to study back at the cave later. He had even brought a sonar device to see if there was anything or anyone there besides him. And what did he have to show for it?

Nothing.

There was no trace of anything unusual, even by his paranoid standards. Eventually, Bruce decided enough was enough and went back to the manhole he had come in through. But when he did, something was waiting for him.

It was sitting on the ledge just above the water, right where the ladder to the surface began. A feather. A single, unblemished, snow white feather. It certainly hadn't been there when he came in. So someone had placed it there after him. _For_ him.

Bruce whipped around when he heard a slash in the water, and aimed his flashlight towards the source. There was still nothing there, but the ripples in the water confirmed that something had just been there.

Bruce moved closer to investigate, careful not to agitate the water and give away his location.

When he made it to the center of the ripples, Bruce turned to either side to look for the source.

Once he did, his heart stopped.

It was right there, carved into one of the many bricks that made up the walls around him. An owl. One that hadn't been there when he first arrived.

In that moment of daze, a force rammed at him from behind. Before Bruce could react, he was being thrown face first into the brick he was just looking at, and held there by a hand keeping a firm grip on the back of his head.

Bruce knew who it was the moment they spoke. He never forgot a voice.

"I told you this wasn't over Wayne."

William Cobb

Before Bruce could fight out of his grip, Cobb delivered a sharp blow to the center of his back, smashing him further against the wall. But this time, the wall actually collapsed, and the next thing he knew Bruce was falling.

When he finally hit a solid surface, he only had a moment to gather himself before a blinding white light turned on above him, piercing the darkness.

Bruce squinted against it in order to get his barrings. He didn't know where he was. He had never seen this part of Gotham, and that alone was terrifying. He was surrounded by impossibly white marble walls, built high up like the walls of a prison. As Bruce continued to look around, he saw that he was in the center of a type of crossroads. He was at the exact point where four hallways met. Taking his chances, Bruce ran down one of them until he hit another fork in his path. After continuing this process twice more, it finally occurred to Bruce where he was.

It was a _maze_.

I gigantic and impossibly complex labyrinth, built right underneath the city.

And as Bruce looked up at the high marble walls that seemed to continue up without end, Bruce remembered what he had found earlier. Marble underneath his ancestors' finger nails.

They had been scratching to get away. To get free. To get help.

But no one ever came for them.

And Bruce hadn't told anyone where he was going.

So no one was coming for him.

_"Welcome, Batman. Welcome to our Labyrinth!"_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (1) Even though I spelled it with a 'k', writing Rick Grayson is actually physically painful for obvious reasons. Still, I had to distinguish him somehow because referring to him as Richard would have been too confusing.
> 
> BTW my cousin is out of the hospital. Thank you all so much for your positive feedback and prayers. It meant a lot to him and my aunt.
> 
> Anyway, I've started up online learning so updates are going to be less frequent now. But it would definitely motivate me to get comments. XD
> 
> PLZ tell me what you thought, even if it's constructive criticism. 
> 
> Until next time~


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